


Espionage Exploits

by NutheadGee



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Ana is a great Boss, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blowjobs, He catches Feels First, Humour, Jack Is So Thirsty, M/M, Masturbation, Rein is the Friend With the WIsdom, Rimming, Sarcasm, Slow Burnish, Smut, Spy!Gabriel, Spy!Jack, pinning, plot heavy, spy AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2018-12-23 20:41:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 54,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11997573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NutheadGee/pseuds/NutheadGee
Summary: Agent Gabriel Reyes is the best spy in Blackwatch, the organisation whose sole task is the survival of Overwatch at all costs. The Director, Ana Amari is one of his closest friends and his immediate boss, and she smells traitors deep within the United Nations, and very probably in Overwatch, planted by Talon, a shadowy organisation made of greedy and capitalistic individuals, whose main aim is to topple the entire financial system and begin their plans of world domination via a capitalistic dystopia that will be built by financial slaves benefiting only an elite few. Ana needs Gabriel to investigate and eliminate the leaders of Talon to prevent this disaster. Brilliant as Gabriel is, this is something he can't do by himself, so Director Amari assigns Agent Jack Morrison, another of her most brilliant of spies to help out.This is going to go great.





	1. Meeting Each Other

**Author's Note:**

> Excuse the title. I'm uploading this at 1.30 am and my brain is somewhat broken.

“Hello Mr. Reyes. Welcome back. Captain Amari will see you now.”

Gabriel looked up from the very old National Geographic magazine he was reading, closing it and putting it back. He smiled at the secretary, relaying his thanks, watching her face bloom crimson as she looked back at her computer screen and stuttered something under her breath. She was so easy to fluster and it was very amusing to him. That aside she was a lovely young woman and it gave him a semblance of joy to see some kind of positive reaction from her because he knew that sometimes this job proved very tiring for her.

“You’re looking absolutely fantastic today, Gabriel,” Ana noted, as Gabriel closed the door of her office. He was in a suit (navy blue today), three piece and double breasted, with a white shirt and a lavender tie and black leather shoes, polished to a perfect shine. He had also most definitely had his hair done, his usual fade cut looking a lot more trimmed, curls still thick and defined. Ana wasn’t one to admire men most times, considering she’d been happily married for the better part of a decade and a half, but she had to admit that Gabriel was easily one of the most attractive men she had ever met in her life.

And considering her line of work, that was an  _ extremely _ tall order.

“When am I never looking fantastic, Ana?” He responded, his lazy baritone sounding very relaxed, a small smile on his face, standing in front of her desk, pocketing, his body language relaxed. That last week off must have really done wonders for him, because when he arrived he was a fucking mess. Ana rolled her eyes, smiling herself. This man could be so cocky at times, though objectively speaking, he had every right to be.

“Immediately after a mission, for one. You drag yourself in here looking like a wet raccoon.”

“Oi.”

“Anyway, I never called you here to talk about your fashion sense. I’d like to begin by discussing your previous mission and then your next one.” Gabriel sat up straight, schooling his features to neutrality. This was another reason why Ana considered him one easily one of her best, if not  _ the  _ best spies he had. He could make himself as blank as paper, even in his body language. Gabriel was one of the hardest individuals to read, even for Ana, one of the foremost minds non human communication, verbal or nonverbal.

The previous mission had been a success, so good, in fact, that he had finished it earlier than the projected time. That was a good thing because then Overwatch and by extension the United Nations, their parent organisation would be able to leave them alone for another couple of months. His job was to go investigate a particular individual - the then current, now former General Assembly President - in New York with his connections to Talon, and once that was established he was meant to arrested and taken to jail on a range of international white collar crimes including forgeries, bribery and money laundering. He had just successfully had him indicted in Belgium,his home country where he had committed these crimes, before he came back, and Ana had given him one week paid off, where he had thoroughly indulged himself with good food, good sleep and superb massages and spas. The fact that Ana had called him back didn’t signal good news. It was going to be a long next couple of months.

“I did some further digging on the information that you gave me, and it’s not good. Talon goes far deeper than we thought, and it’s pretty bad if I’m going to be honest.” Ana’s voice was neutral, like her body language. She was stating facts, being realistic and as bad as this situation was, both of them needed to be calm so that they could go through this entire mess properly and come up with the best way(s) to combat it.

The man Gabriel recently had indicted, Vasil Willems was a member of Talon, an international secret organisation that comprised of sophisticated white collar criminals.They are all greedy, wealthy, selfish capitalists, owning and having heavy investments in the banking, financial, media and telecommunications sectors in the world. They were the shadowy controllers of the entire financial and banking sector, and they have about a ninety five percent control in international media and telecommunications. They were headquartered in London, but they also have major bases in New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai and Doha, meaning, Gabriel realised with increased horror as he did his research on Willems, they had the literal control of every single major financial centre in the world. 

When Gabriel relayed to Ana this information as it pertained to Willems, telling her that this was deeper than it seemed and he just didn’t have the time to dig further, she continued where he left off. She found out that Talon’s main aim was to completely destroy the current financial system as it was, plunge the world into chaos by causing a much larger and more devastating scale of the Global Financial Crisis then “donate” funds to governments and institutions to “save” them, when in turn hold all heads of state at ransom to create a capitalistic dystopia of oblivious slaves living in a highly controlled and regulated society to continuously churn income for a select few.

It honestly sounded like something out of a badly written young adult novel, but this was going to be the grim reality if they weren’t stopped. There were just a few select problems when it came to executing the stopping them part.

“I don’t know where to start. Talon isn’t an easy organisation to crumble, simply because of how, well organised and hierarchical they are. Getting rid of one of them won’t work because then they’ll almost be immediately replaced. They have such a strong foundation that even crippling it won’t cause enough damage to destabilise them.” Gabriel had honestly never heard Ana sound so defeated. He  stared down at her the information she had gotten,part of it on paper, part of it digital.

“We don’t really have much time, do we?” Gabriel asked, his eyes moving from the information to Ana.

“Unfortunately not. However, I do have a proposition.”

Gabriel raised his eyebrow. He was either going to really love this or absolutely despise this. There was going to be no in between.

“As much as I trust you and I’m extremely confident in your abilities, I think this one time you’ll benefit in having a collaboration.”

Ana wasn’t exactly sure how Gabriel would react at the prospect of working with someone else. She was right to believe that he was one of her best agents and he was one of her closest friends, but he had never really been in the field with someone else in his whole career because he was just  _ that  _ good, but Ana supposed there was a first time for everything. She was really nervous.

Gabriel, quite frankly, was ready for anything, but he wasn’t quite ready for a collaboration though. Not that he was particularly angry about it, it was just unexpected. He was self-aware though. He knew he was difficult to work with because of his pace and how most of his information was stored mentally or on a notebook constantly on his person, but he also understood the gravity of the situation and the complexity of this particular mission. As good as he was, it was going to be an exceptionally tall order for him to be able to achieve this on his own on a reasonable time frame.

Gabriel leaned further into his chair, left ankle on his right knee, hands clasped together on his lap. “Who do you have in mind?”

“Jack Morrison.”

Well,  _ that  _ he was most definitely not expecting.

“Really.” As much as it was supposed to be a question it came out so flat and deadpan it ended up being a question. Ana smiled, very amused.

“Gabe, listen.” She couldn’t believe she’d just called him by his nickname. “His not-very-secret crush on you aside, he’s a great agent, not to mention he’s probably the only one that can work with you because he’ll ignore your sarcastic snark when he sees, like a glance of skin or something. He’s actually good at his job, Gabriel. I promise you. You have my-”

“Ana, it’s not his skill I question, it’s the nature of this mission and his personality. He’s very...impulsive. We both know this thing is going to be long and complicated, and I really won’t be in the best of moods when I have to do impromptu clean up.”

Ana snorted, raising an eyebrow at him. “Look at it this way, Gabriel. He’s very by the books, and he should keep you in line when all the blood in that brilliant mind of yours rushes to your dick and you have a strong need to be petty and sleep with someone you shouldn’t. You balance each other. If you have to clean up due to his impromptu impulsiveness as you put it, he’s gonna have to go all diplomatic when whoever you raw lets it slip out. Neither of you are down for that, so just the impending threat is enough to keep you both in line,”

Gabriel chuckled. “Sex is good for the soul, plus I appreciate the human form. I’m not going to let an attractive human being pass by me without the need to indulge myself,  _ and _ I also never jeopardise the mission.”

It was Ana’s turn to chuckle. “I appreciate that mentality. Now when you feel the need to fuck someone you can always fuck Morrison. God knows he’s ready, willing and able to offer you any body part you so require to satiate your needs.”

Gabriel looked away, biting his lower lip and Ana smirked. He might not have been as smitten as Jack was, but Ana knew Gabriel wasn’t one to not appreciate an attractive person when he saw one.

Especially when that attractive person was off limits. Like Jack Morrison.

“I don’t get into relationships with my fellow agents, Ana. Personal rule.”

Ana smiled sweetly. “It’s not ’getting into a relationship’ when it’s just sex, Gabriel. If you can have detached sex with the wife of one of the most dangerous arms dealers in the world, I’m sure you can have detached sex with a fellow agent.”

“She needed some happiness before she saw me put a bullet through his head.”

Ana was picking up her phone, still smiling that sweet smile of hers. Gabriel sighed. He was stuck here. Nothing would change her mind. He watched her call Morrison, and when she was done they sat together in comfortable silence, waiting for him to turn up. 

Well, what a mission this was going to be.

…

Jack was slightly anxious. He was sure he hadn’t done anything remotely wrong, so that possibly couldn’t be why Ana called him into her office. It had been about a fortnight since he’d completed his last mission, and Ana told him to just chill out and take a break, since she had something she wanted him to work on. Hopefully this was it? Perhaps? He didn’t know. What he did know, though, was that he was eternally grateful for having dressed up today.

He got to the office, making sure to shoot a dashing smile at the secretary (she was so adorable when she blushed like that) before allowing himself into the office, and almost fainted.

“Hello Jack. Welcome. Please have a seat.”

Jack finally managed to remember his brain was working, before muttering his thanks and taking a seat next to  _ Gabriel Reyes.  _ He was sure his face looked like a ketchup bottle. He turned to Ana, staring right at her because then at least he wouldn’t lose his train of thought and sound like a fucking idiot.

“How are you doing today?”

He nodded. “I’m good.”

“Lovely. Now, remember about the mission I told you about?”

Jack nodded again, his throat going dry when he saw Gabriel from the corner of his eye adjust one of his cufflinks, then running his hands through his hair, fingers getting lost in those thick curls. What Jack would do…

“Well, you’ll be working with Gabriel here, and I’ve called you in to talk about it, a mini briefing if you will. We’ll organise when the actual briefing will be.”

As they talked about the mission, Gabriel couldn’t help but observe Jack. He looked absolutely stunning in his grey suite, also three piece and double breasted, white shirt and green tie, as he paid the utmost attention to Ana as she explained to both of them what their mission was all about. He particularly loved the unruly hair, those bright blue eyes, stunning and sharp, the defined jawline, lined with a thin stubble, strong nose and relatively full lips, at least full for a white man. Gabriel also admitted to himself that he loved how Jack’s face went red when he realised that Gabriel had as much as glanced at him, and he was slightly surprised when he thought about how he wanted to see that again. Jack Morrison was a very attractive man.

“There will be a lot of travel involved, and this mission is going to take a pretty long time. I chose you because you’re a very good agent and I trust you, and I also chose you because you’re just about the only person in Blackwatch who can actually work with Gabriel.”

Jack felt himself blush again, but he kept his eyes trained on Ana, nodding once.

“Very well gentlemen, that’s it for now. I’ll get back in touch for your official briefing. This mission is somewhat clandestine, so the higher ups in bureaucratic utopia don’t know it’s happening, and I have every intention to keep it that way. Now get the fuck out of my office. I have favours to call on.”

…

Jack barely managed to get to his office, looking at his reflection on his computer screen. His face was still slightly flushed, but other than that there was really no difference. Gabriel Reyes was easily one of the most handsome men he had ever seen in his life.

He buried his face in his hands, already thinking about those sharp, brown eyes, always analytical and calculating, his neatly trimmed moustache and goatee, full lips and his  _ jawline.  _ God that jawline was strong enough to cassy his sins, and the fact that he was so confident, so compelling and so charming. He was a phenomenal agent - his reputation always preceded him - and Jack was going to be working with him on a long term mission. He was simultaneously so excited and so nervous because he really didn’t want to fuck this up. If there was an agent he wanted to impress, it had to be Gabriel.

Jack blushed again when he thought about working with Gabriel, thought how he would be bouncing ideas with him in their briefing, the flight to Shanghai...this was truly a dream come true for him, and he couldn’t wait to start. Now that he had somewhat of a rough idea of what he was working with, it was time for him to look at these documents Ana had sent him. He couldn’t bring himself to look like an idiot at the briefing.


	2. Petras

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry, in between travel, solving my sexual identity and thirst, this has been long overdue. Here it is though. Updates will be more frequent. I promise.

Gabriel honestly didn’t know how to feel about this briefing.

When Ana said that this mission was going to be clandestine, he didn’t know everyone else was  _ this  _ out of the loop. He had never had a brief with this few people in his career, and by few people he meant just literally him and Jack. And even then, there was still a lot not yet covered. Gabriel was anticipating this mission was going to last about six months to a year, but he had an idea that it was going to go longer than that. He wasn’t quite sure whether to be happy or angry about that, because as much as he knew he was going to be away from this shithole for long, he knew he had to make occasional trips back on the regular and stay for a bit to keep their front going. Oh boy.

“Okay, so I’m going to be quick. I’ve set up a private network away from prying eyes where we’ll be communicating and sending information to each other, but everything we’ll discuss in this brief dies in this room. There’s some information you need to memorise, but I’m sure you’ll manage,” Ana said, or as Gabriel supposed he should start referring to her, Director Amari.

“We’re gonna start off at Doha. Not exactly a major financial city like Dubai, but it’s close enough and it’s much more closely linked to Dubai without actually being in the United Arab Emirates. It’s also where Talon’s HQs in the Middle East are, so it’s just killing two birds with one stone.” She looked at both of them who were paying attention to her. “Both of you are going to be working for the Qatar National Bank, or QNB as it’s colloquially called. Gabe you’re going to be in the actual headquarters of the bank in the Global Cash Management department and you Jack are going to be in the stock exchange as a broker, representing the bank. I managed to get you both in reasonably high positions, where you’ll be able to get a lot of important information without rousing the suspicion of the higher ups and but also without having to go through the bureaucracy. I love my Arab brothers and sisters but fuck do they like unnecessary procedures.”

Gabriel was impressed. “How did you manage all this?”

Ana smiled sweetly. “Favours I did for people back in the day. Now, let’s get to what exactly you’ll be doing so that we can try and figure out how long you both need to be there.”

The story was that Talon hadn’t completely solidified their hold in the Middle East, which explained why they had decided to start off in Qatar and later move to the United Arab Emirates. Apparently some of the Talon higher ups were quite Islamophobic, and for the longest time had refused to create any business connections with local Arabs. However, as the Middle East begun growing economically, there was some internal conflict happening because there was a lot of financial control up in the air, and it would be important for Talon’s interests for them to achieve some kind of stronghold there, particularly when it came to the entertainment that was offered, due to their hold in the telecommunications industry. Some of the more blatantly discriminatively individuals were gotten rid of and promptly replaced, and they begun to move.

They were slightly late, but not too late to grease  some people’s hands to allow them to penetrate the market, as it were, as Ana promptly informed them. “There are three guys at the top who need to be eliminated before you leave Doha. Remember, the people you are executing are at the very top, or at least heavily influence decisions made at the very top. They are  _ extremely _ trusted, and getting rid of them will prove to be a serious thorn to Talon’s side, because replacing them is gonna be difficult. After they die you come back and lay low for about a month or so, before we plan your next destination. Of course you can’t just walk into the bank, demand to see these guys and murder them. We need information. People can be replaced, but financial destruction is a little more difficult to recover from.”

Jack leaned back in his chair, looking between his notes, his boss and his colleague. He thought he had gotten everything down, but he wasn’t sure if it was question and answer time.

“Questions?” Ana asked, looking to both of them. Well, speak of the devil.

“What specific information do you want us to get?” He asked first.

“Every single economic transaction they make: buying and selling of assets, buying and selling of shares, exchange of cash and other instruments in the region, that kind of thing. If you can, I’d also really appreciate if you noted the specific individuals or companies that participate in these transactions . This information will help us narrow down who we need to target after Doha and figure out any vulnerabilities Talon has on the inside.”

Jack clenched his jaw for a second before asking the next question. “What is the maximum time frame we are to complete this mission, from arrival until execution?”

Ana stared at him, her gaze hard, before she turned to Gabriel for a bit and back  to Jack, who, at this point, was sure neither he nor his new partner weren’t going to be happy with the answer they could get. “Four months.”

“That’s going to be...difficult,” he muttered, looking right back at her. Gabriel seemed to agree.

“That’s asking for a little too much Ana, don’t you think? I appreciate that you trust us enough to assign us such a highly ranked, secret mission, but four months to get that much information is a little above and beyond.”

Ana sighed, looking at the two spies in front of her. “I do. I know I’m asking for a lot. A lot more than I normally do, even from agents of your calibre, but I ask for trust. Trust me, trust your contact, trust yourselves and trust each other. Trust that we’ll get this done in four months, because the longer this delays the more powerful Talon gets, and the more powerful Talon becomes, the more difficult it will to take them down.”

It was silent for a moments, arguably tense. “Grace period?” Gabriel asked. He was probably the only one brave enough to.

Ana’s brown eyes flashed with irritation for a split second, before she calmed down. Oh boy, Gabriel thought in his head. He’d hit a pretty sore spot, which was enough to tell him just how frustrated she was with this whole issue. Understandable, considering she had to hide it off from literally everyone else in this entire fucking organisation.

“Two months,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’d really appreciate it if you did it in less than two months though.”

Gabriel breathed out slowly through his nose, as Jack fiddled with his pen, as he scanned his notes again. “We’ll try. We can’t guarantee it, but we’ll definitely try.”

Ana sighed, and both Gabriel and Jack could literally hear her exhaustion, as well as see it in the slump of her shoulders. It was then that they realised just how much of a toll this fucking mission was taking on her. Jack was the first one to get up, pulling her into an embrace, before Gabriel did the same. “We gotchu, Ana. Never forget that. Now, tell us about our information broker for this bullshit mission and our contact in Doha.”

…

Gabriel, Jack and Ana were walking towards their respective work spaces, when all of them got beeps on their work tablets. The light was blinking red, which mean a superior wanted to talk. All of them tensed. Overwatch bureaucracy was known to be one of the most notorious currently, according to Ana, and she could talk because she came from a pretty bureaucratic country.

“Fuck my life,” Gabriel grumbled, rolling his eyes. He timed out his tablet again, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. Ana growled low in her throat, closing her eyes for a moment and swallowing, trying to call on her patience to deal with this bullshit. Jack sighed, his shoulders heaving because though he understood why Ana and Gabriel reacted the way he did, he was sure that mess was gonna unintentionally spill onto him and quite frankly he wasn't sure if he was in the mood.

“Let’s just go get this over with,” Ana said, leading her agents to Director Elias Petras’ office. All three of managed something of a stiff smile at the secretary, who was everything you would expect of a secretary that worked for Petras: selfish, entitled, white and most likely racist.

It didn’t help that Petras himself was in a bad mood. His face was red as a lobster, beads of sweat on his forehead and the collar of his shirt, which prompted all three of them to make a face. His meaty flesh was moving about as he shook his head, and they were sure they could see spittle flying out of his thin-lipped mouth, his teeth bared in what was supposed to be a snarl, barking commands and demanding answers in his native Italian. His beady eyes were wide open, the lines at the edges more crinkled, the veins on his neck bulging out more. He finished his yelling, slamming down the receiver with a lot more force than necessary, and turned back to his three guests. He groaned at them, waving his large, meaty hand dismissively. “Have a seat,” he said, sounding irritated, as if he hadn’t called for them. It took all the self-control he had for Gabriel to not roll his eyes.

He cleared his throat, turning to them as he cleaned his brow with a silk handkerchief. It never did much to clean the perspiration, but he tried.

“Please excuse me. I’m sorry about that. I don’t like inconveniences in my work. Now,” he leaned forward, his hands clasped in front of him on the table, looking at them. Ana had never felt more unfortable in her life, and that said a lot considering her line of work. “I can tell from the records that you have given your two agents here very long breaks. May I know why?”

Ana blinked slowly at him, thinking about how she would phrase her response. “They both just came from very demanding missions and I wanted them to have a break before I assigned them again.” She nodded once to his personal computer. “If you read the reports I sent you that they both wrote you would know I’m already planning to send them to another mission.”

Petras narrowed his eyes, and Gabriel had to bite his cheek to stop himself from smirking. God she could be so shady and honestly it gave him life. Petras fidgeted in his chair, knowing that he had been caught, and took a file from the corner of his desk, opening it and pretending to skim over it. He then reached for his specs, hanging over his neck into his chest, and read a few words before speaking again.

“Have you heard about what has happened to Vasil Willems?”

Gabriel didn’t know about his colleague and his boss, but he had to clench his jaw so hard he was sure he’s lost some centimetres of enamel on them. He knew Petras’ racism would never allow him to let this go, and that he would bring it up eventually.

Especially considering that Willems’ successor was a black woman.

“Yes,” Gabriel responded as the other two nodded. This action prompted Petras to turn his attention to him, and Gabriel met his gaze levelly.

“Ah, of course, Agent Reyes. You were the one that indicted him.” The could all hear the bitter undertones in the statement, as if he was actually upset.

“Just doing my job, DIrector.” Gabriel tried to keep the sarcasm out of his voice, but some of it managed to leak out anyway. He thought Petras would be too self-absorbed to notice.

“I personally don’t even see the reason he had to be investigated. He was held under duress, he said. He did the things he did because his family and his entire livelihood had been threatened by his former bosses. I honestly don’t understand why the United Nations could not understand that fact. He was just trying to survive, not to mention he was brilliant too, very intelligent and qualified. Now he’ll be left to rot in prison, have all that talent go to waste because of prejudice.”

Jack was  _ fuming  _ in his chair, but at merely looking at him no one could ever tell. Petras was literally defending an individual who was part of an international terrorist organisation, who was trying to dismantle the current system as it was for his aforementioned terrorist organisation’s benefit (and probably his) and had infiltrated the UN, his parent organisation, to twist everything to benefit his benefactors. Petras was not going to benefit in any way whatsoever, yet here he was, talking about how one of the most privileged men in the world was prejudiced. He wondered if Petras had clocked it at some point in the past.

“Excuse me, Director Petras,” Jack begin, his voice neutral. “With all due respect, actions have consequences. Willems knew exactly what he was doing when he was committing all those white collar crimes. He should have reasonably known that he wouldn’t have gotten away with it, particularly the higher he rose up in the United Nations. Calling his ...relatively ungraceful fall a result of ‘prejudice’ isn’t particularly accurate.”

Petras immediately snapped his head towards Jack, beady eyes narrowed, the skin on his face and his neck jiggling. “What makes you say that?! He was set up!” His voice had risen a little bit, and he was panting, but he managed to catch himself and breathed out slowly, calming down, and settling back on his table, removing his specs from his eyes, elbows on the table, his hands in between his upper lip and his nose. It was obvious he was still agitated, but he was trying to reign in his anger. 

This was the first meeting Jack was having with this man and he already hated him.

“He was probably set up by that little assistant of his too. She was jealous that she could never rise to his position, so she orchestrated his downfall so that she could take his place. These black women; always so aggressive.”

Gabriel had clenched his fists on the side of his leg, but opted to say nothing. Petras’ discrimination - in particular his racism, homophobia and misogyny - wasn’t exactly a secret within all Overwatch and Blackwatch ranks. The only reason Ana had remained Director of Blackwatch was because it was out of Overwatch’s jurisdiction. Blackwatch was only accountable to the United Nations, and even then, they rarely ever interfered with their work, which was probably the reason Ana was able to mastermind this mission from right under their noses.

“Again, excuse my boldness, director, but don’t you think blaming Dr. Owino for Willems’ downfall is a little unfiar? What reason did she have to topple him? She had nothing to prove. Her title speaks for itself that she was perfectly qualified to be his boss. It’s just that some...individuals refuse to acknowledge a black woman - from Africa, no less - should be higher than a white man.”

Petras stared at Jack, opening his mouth then closing it again, having nothing to say to defend himself. He had been caught and he knew it, and it had irritated him. All three of them had to physically refrain themselves from smirking.

“Anyway, Director Amari, which mission are you assigning these gentlemen?” Petras asked, changing hte subject.

“Classified,” Ana promptly responded. “It’s  amatter of Overwatch security, probbaly even survival. I’m not obligated to share it with anyone else other than operatives directly involved.” Her face was as blank as the lily white walls surrounding them.

Petras leaned in, looking Ana in the eye. “I am the director of Overwatch - “

“And Blackwatch is not under your juridiction, last I heard. If you really want to know, you can take up with the United Nations. After all, aren’t you always talking about due processes?”

Petras sat back straight in his chair. “Get the fuck out of my office,” he yelled, agitated, as if he neverexpected this conversation to go like this.

“He’s furiously typing numbers now, isn’t he?” Jack asked, snickering.

“Nah. He knows it’sll be about three months before the UN even gets back to him. Him whims are the least of their concern. He knows it, we know it, he knows we know it, and pisses him the fuck off.” Gabriel couldn’t have sounded more smug if he tried.

Ana clapped once. “Alright boys, go pack up. You flgiht leaves at six AM tomorrow. Of you doare miss it I’ll wax your legs smoother than a baby’s forehead. All the info is in your pads. Have a nice read in bed as you masturbate to each other.”

Well, this was going to be a mission and a half.


	3. Meets and greets

Well, things were already looking very interesting for this mission, and it hadn’t even been twenty fours since they landed in Qatar.

They had just called an Uber to their hotel when they both got a text from a lady called Madeleine McAffee. They both hopped she was the contact Ana was talking about them meeting because no one knew of these numbers nor the time they were arriving in  Doha, so if they were already compromised before they had even begun, then this was going to prove to be a massive problem.

Anyway, the text welcomed them to Doha, and asked them to go and get some good rest, because the next day they would be getting right into the action. They had also been informed that they had three days to get themselves acquainted with the place and to rest, before they’d go straight to work. Gabriel sighed. Yes time was of the essence but he wasn’t used to this at all, immediately beginning to work. He wasn’t complaining too much though. It had been a pretty long flight, and he really needed a good shower, a good meal and a good sleep.

Which is how they found themselves in their hotel lobby, at ten in the morning, after a very hearty breakfast, meeting their contact. She quite wasn’t what they expected, but with Ana, you could never really be too sure with what to expect, which was one of the reasons she was so goddamn good at her job. Neither of them was even truly sure whether or not she was part of Blackwatch, and quite frankly, it was best if things stayed that way.

“Morning, gentlemen. Madeleine McAfee. A pleasure to meet you. Welcome to Doha.” Flaming red hair flowing over her shoulders,  bright blue eyes and a Scottish accent thicker than any mud their highlands have ever produces. She was looking absolutely spectacular in her black suit and her grey shirt. She looked like such a normal, corporate young woman, but both Gabriel and Jack knew that if her wanted she could snap their necks like twigs with her pinky finger if she wanted, they could tell from her firm handshake. She was quite tall, almost their height, but that was probably the heels. Even then without them she was still considered taller than the average woman. What was with Ana and surrounding herself with extremely terrifying people? They all took a seat around the small coffee table on the small but puffy chairs as they introduced themselves to her.

“Very sorry to schedule this abrupt meeting, but I had to. We have to put a front according to Ana, so that Overwatch and that deformed cockroach Petras can stay off her dick. You both actually start work on Monday, in about 5 days, but there’s a lot I need to get through to you before then.” She pulled out her tablet, showing it to them. It was larger than the regular one, almost as big as your average laptop screen.

“I’m not going to bore you to tears giving  you information on what you already have.  What I am going to bore you to death with, however, is what information you’re going to collect, how you will collect it and who you are to trust in your respective jobs,” she said, leaning forward, perfectly manicured nails tapping across the dimmed screen of the gadget before them. She turned to Gabriel first.

“I’m going to be very blunt with you, Gabriel, and forgive me if you’re already aware of this” she said, her voice taking a much more sombre tone. “Arabs are extremely anti-black, mostly due to white supremacy, but culture and misinterpretation of religion also plays a part. The don’t care whether you’re from the West or not. As long as you’re black they’ll discriminate against you. However, they are also not stupid. If they see an opportunity to make money, or the potential to build future individualistic relationships, they will jump onto it immediately. Of course you have the choice to show them that you’re just as capable as other non black people, but that’s up to you. Either way if they see reason to respect you, they will respect you as an individual, but not your people.”

Gabriel calmly sipped his water. Oh, he was aware of this alright. He had heard the stories, seen the news; Arabs dropping their black domestic workers off balconies, stories and stories up, pouring scalding water - even sometimes oil, when the cruelty really came through - on them and leaving them with burns so bad they died from the pain alone, decapitation, denying them food and water and then leaving them in the desert to slowly waste away at the mercy of the punishing heat and the ruthless predators. As a black man he learnt to go into places with the mentality that people would simply hate him for his skin colour. It wasn’t the best way to approach things, but it saved him a whole lot of unnecessary hurt. Cynicism and a thick skin were very integral in his line of work, and he had perfected them to a near art.

“That being said, they will tend to respect you at the very least, probably grudgingly, if they see you’re educated and well travelled. If you’re qualified to hold a decent position in a respectable company - just like your current one - they will try to hide their anti-blackness from you, though it will slip out on occasion, but you have every right to call them out on it. Just make sure that you make it clear that  _ they  _ are the ones that need something from  _ you.  _ As long as you hold all the power, then you’re always at the advantage. Arabs have a thing for power.”

She then went on to explain what exactly he would be looking out for at work. It turned out that Talon had been doing a lot of transactions recently, particularly in the buying of assets in the region, and then pumping a whole lot of money in aforementioned assets. They were buying a lot of different shares in different industries - focusing on finance, insurance, banking and telecommunications - but they were making sure the shares were not too much to rouse suspicion, but enough to have a small say in how the companies are run. This was their general mode of operations when they were getting themselves acquainted in a country or region.

Gabriel Job, therefore, was to keep an eye on all these transactions, see who the important players were and figure out how to form some kind of relationship with them, and if lucky enough, get to meet them and get to know them. Fair enough. He could definitely do that.

Madeleine turned to Jack.

“You, on the other hand is going to have a much better rime here, because you are, quite literally, the ideal kind of person Arabs love to glamourise. Absolutely no one will bother or question, and probably they will leave you to your own devices for the most part, or even come and ask you opinions on things, which gives you much more room to get away with a lot more. Your personality too will allow you to...distract them as Gabriel here mines necessary information for out course.”

She shifted in her chair, moving the tablet towards him and minimising and maximising windows as she saw fit. “You will have full access to the back room, and most of the contracts you’ll be dealing with will be for these seven companies in particular. Of course you’ll be dealing with everything, but Ana asked me to put you in a position where you can  closely monitor these companies’ transactions because these are the ones our mates over at Talon control.”

She flipped through the tablet a couple of more times, giving Jack time to at least skim over the content, before she promptly took it off the table and sat straight in her chair, switching off the device and putting it on the side of her chair, crossing her legs and placing her hands demurely on them.

“I have Jack in Gabriel’s department, so that you,” she pointed at Jack. “Is directly responsible to you.” She moved her finger to Gabriel.

“It’s going to be much easier for all of us this way, because then Jack can relay information to Gabriel which he can use to compare and contrast with the information he already has, and it also helps the Arabs being out of our hair a lot, because then they would have to talk to Gabriel a lot, and their anti-blackness really can’t allow them to accept the fact that Gabriel is a boss, let alone someone they have to interact with if they want some very  specific information. I never thought I’d ever use anti-blackness to my advantage but here I am.”

“Quite one to talk about anti blackness, aren't you, as a white, European woman,” Gabriel immediately said, his voice not entirely a snap but there was a sharp edge to it. Madeleine paused for a moment, eyes widening as it dawned on her what she had said and she shook her head.

“I apologise. I didn’t mean I don’t benefit from it. I was just talking abou-”

“It’s not in your place to talk about it. You should know better,” Gabriel interrupted, his voice low, eyes narrowed.

Madeleine nodded, lowering her eyes. “I should. I apologise.”

Gabriel nodded, acknowledging her apology. That seemed to reduce the tension that had suddenly appeared, and Jack, who had been a little tense in his seat the whole time, relaxed again. He had wanted to defend Madeleine, because he knew she meant no harm in the statement, but he also understood not only was it not also in his place, but she also needed this reinforced to herm and what better person to do it than Gabriel. He, after all, directly and indirectly suffered from anti-blackness.

“Any questions?” she asked, voice neutral, but both Gabriel and Jack could feel the waver beneath it. 

“Actually yes,” Jack said, leaning forward, looking right at her. “Why are you helping Ana?”

Madeleine sat back, chewing her lower lip, staring at her hands for a moment. It was as if she was contemplating how to answer the question, something, Jack noted mentally, as she looked up at them, resolve in her eyes, that was very intelligent of her.

“Selfish reasons, mostly, but I don’t want Talon to subject other people what they subjected my family to,” she said quietly. “So it’s part revenge, part a sense of the need to do good I suppose.” She shrugged, and there was something in that shrug that showed a great deal of pain, regret and anger.

Gabriel and Jack simply nodded at her to acknowledge her answer. 

“Now,” she said, standing up. “I’ll be back the day after tomorrow to take you to your offices and get you acquainted with everything. Then come Monday, you're in with the wolves.

Gabriel and Jack shared a look at that statement. They weren’t sure if they liked or hated that statement, but they would have to wait till Monday to see.

…

Well, this was going to turn up to be very interesting.

There were very many observations Gabriel made the second he walked into his office on his first day of work. The first one was that he was the only black person there. Literally. Secondly, he was  _ everyone’s  _ boss, and quite a number of the people here - mostly white and Arab men -  weren’t particularly pleased with that fact, as much as they tried to smile fakely at him. His inner pettiness was ready to consistently remind them that if the thought of being under the authority of a black man wounded them so much they could always quit, but he wasn’t here to be petty, but he could indulge himself just a little bit. He had a job to do and Ana wouldn’t be amused if he got into trouble within his first week, so what he did - and what he was one hundred percent sure would piss them off even more, which is why he did it - was acknowledge them with a nod and tell them to get back to work.

Later on he was laughing about it with Jack.

“I honestly can’t believe you told them to get back to work. Holy shit you’re brave,” Jack sniggered from the other end of the line. Gabriel smirked.

“Well what did they expect? We all have a job to do. Those markets won’t analyse themselves.”

“But you found anything serious though so far?”

Gabriel got back to business. “A lot of transactions. They are buying a lot of shares in select companies and generally moving a lot of money around,” Gabriel muttered, scrolling through his computer screen and occasionally checking on the papers on his desk, phone in between his shoulder and the side of his face, his head bent at an angle. “There are multiple different names going on, but so far I can get two that seem to be consistent and appearing in most of these transactions. How about you?”

Jack paused for a moment, and Gabriel could hear some faint rustling in the background.

“Yep, same thing. There’s a lot of money and shares going round, and I’ve also found out at least one young woman whose absolutely in love with one of the Talon big guys. I’m not sure if she’s actually affiliated with them or is one of them. I’ll have to dig more into that, but she’s definitely a massive fan of this guy. I’ll get back to you with more on her.”

Gabriel nodded, before remembering he was on the phone. “Nice. I’ve given you full authority on dealing with the shares and funds of these companies, so hopefully that should make things a bit easier for you. I’m going to call Ana and tell her what we’ve gotten so far and it’s only the first day. Lord this is gonna be a trip.”

Jack laughed. “Do we get paid enough for this shit?”

“Of course we fucking don’t. Get back to work, blondie.”

…

Ana seemed quite impressed. “I’d still say tone it down on the pettiness, though they provoked it.”

Gabriel’s voice was flat and deadpan. “I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Gabriel.”

“Fine.”

“How’s Jack doing?”

“Very well, I wagger. He’s already mined so far deep into their transaction histories he’s about to find how much those old freaks paid for their wigs. I’ve already found and kind of connected the main parties in the money spreading around companies like herpes over here, I just need to figure out how far deep into them I can go without breaching fiduciary duties. And there’s no fucking bacon in this country. They only have beef bacon and that’s garbage.”

“Of course there’s no fucking pork bacon there,  Gabriel. It’s a Muslim country.”

“Well, with the number of expats here, the  _ least  _ they could do - “

“Well, if the expats don’t like it there they can always leave.”

“You right.”

Ana smiled, shaking her head to herself. She truly did have the best agents. “If you really need more information, I can hook you up to someone I know. She’s a kid, about 24, and she has a penchant for juvenile pranks, but she’s an absolute fucking genius and could hack your DNA code given the chance. She’s also extremely self-serving though, but we all share the common thing of despising Talon with everything she’s got, so she’ll help. I’m sure you and her will get along very well, not to sure about Jack though.”

Gabriel sighed. “I’m not being paid enough for this,” he grumbled as Ana hooked him up with this contact. That was it for a day. He could continue dismantling modern day capitalism tomorrow.


	4. It gets worse

“ _ Amigo,”  _ A voice greeted him from the other end of the line. Smooth contralto, but he could hear the mischief underlining it. Gabriel was already feeling a headache coming on and he hadn’t even opened his mouth. “What’s up? Amari gave me your contact, said I should call you outside work hours.”

“Don’t bullshit me, Colomar. Or would you prefer Olivia? Miss Colomar? Sombra? You know every single fact on record about me, but very little about my professional or personal life. You also know the same about Morrison, but you can’t find anything at all to indict or blackmail him with. You reached out to me first, alone, without McAfee and Morrison because you wanted to gauge me, find out exactly what Gabriel Reyes sounded like, away from the  _ gringos _ so that you could know exactly how to carry yourself in our first meeting, and find out if it’s really going to be worth the six hundred thousand Euros my boss sent you as a kind of consultation fee to work with us, and whether it will worth it to both of to keep me and Morrison as a connection to whatever chaos you intend to cause in the near future for Talon. So you either tell me why you went through the effort of making this phone call,  _ amiga,  _ or you can fuck right off until  _ I  _ call  _ you.  _ ”

Gabriel had never sounded more bored in his life, but he knew that Sombra knew how serious he was being. He was honestly expecting this call, which was why he was seated on his bed, cross legged in his boxers, arranging his paperwork on the next topic of discussion with this infamous hacker of theirs.

“How did you know my name?” The playfulness was gone, replaced with a seriousness he never quite expected to hear from her. She was slightly shook. He could hear it in the words, though he admitted she did an excellent job of hiding it.

“I’m a spy. It’s my job to know everything about everything and everyone that I’ll be working with and on,” he said, making sure to relay how smug he was. “And I know you don’t like white people, but don’t fuck around with Morrison. There’s a reason he was assigned to work with me.”

There was some slight fidgeting on the line. “I wasn’t underestimating him.”

“Interesting that you’re trying to decieve one of the biggest deceivers alive.”

It was silent again. “Will you tell him about this call?”

Gabriel studied his notes. “I will, yes. Not McAfee though.”

“Why is there such little record about your professional life online?”

Gabriel chuckled. He could literally  _ hear  _ the terror in her voice. “I think you know the answer to that question,  _ pequeñita.  _ Your biggest strength is also your biggest weakness. You thrive on information, and in this day and age where people are a little more careless with it, they gives you far more power than they should. But the moment you find someone like me or Jack who are almost ghosts almost a ghost, other than some base statistics which will barely help you, it gets a little scary and you don’t know what to do. You barely know about my line of work, yet I know all about yours. Pretty scary when the tables have turned, isn’t it?”

It was silent again. It was time this phone call ended, Gabriel mused. He had proved his point.

“Go to sleep,  _ gatita.  _ I’ll call you tomorrow at the scheduled time. Don’t stress too much about this conversation. All you gotta do is work with us and things will be good.”

She quietly bid him goodnight before hanging up, and Gabriel couldn’t help the smirk on his face. Oh tomorrow was going to be very interesting indeed.

…

“ _ Who  _ did  _ what?! _ ”

Infuriated couldn’t begin to describe what Jack was feeling. Gabriel raised an eyebrow at him, leaning against the doorframe of his room looking sexy as sin. Within a week of them being in Doha they had already gotten an apartment in a very nice area. He would honestly be sad that they were spending UN member states’ hard-earned money, but when he thought about how Petras had no idea about all this, he felt slightly better.

Until he looked up from what he was pretending to read to see Gabriel fucking Reyes, in nothing but basketball shorts and a sleeveless shirt. He honestly never knew how muscular his calves were. 

“I got a call from the hacker Ana hooked us up with”, Gabriel reiterated. His voice was lower than normal, but just as smooth, that baritone making Jack feel funny things at the pit of his belly. “Ana was right. She’s slightly…juvenile, but she’s utterly brilliant if she was able to get into the network and cingle out me without anyone else knowing. I know how Ana is with her private networks. If this kid could bypass all the security measures Ana put in place because she wanted to talk to just  _ me,  _ then it would be real wise to keep her on our side.”

Jack was still slightly miffed, but that was more out of worry than actual anger.

“That’s still dodgy, Gabe. What is she has nefarious intentions? Granted we barely have our lives online, but you can never know. What if she sells us out? We still gotta approach with caution. I’ve never trusted these freelance hackers. They can really easily turn on you, especially when they know there’s a chance for a bigger paycheck. We gotta ask Ana for some background on her, so that-”

Suddenly, Gabriel was all up in his face, his chin held in between Gabriel’s thumb and index finger. He could feel his body heat next to him, those deep, chocolate eyes analysing him, half smirk on his face. Jack could feel molten heat spread through his blood stream, and he was one hundred percent sure his face looked like the inside of a nearly erupting volcano. His breathing rate had definitely increased, and the only thing more embarrassing than the whole state of his arousal was the fact that he knew that Gabriel knew that he was trying to regulate it. He swallowed thickly, and he watched Gabriel’s gaze drop to his throat, watching his adam’s apple bob up and down. Gabriel’s smirk went from nonchalant to slightly sharper, and Jack quite wasn’t sure if his dick twitching in his pants could handle anymore. Speaking of, aforementioned dick was also hardening in his pants as the seconds ticked by, and somewhere in the parts of his mind that his lust hadn't gotten to yet, he was wondering if there was a way he could hide his erection without Gabriel noticing.

Lord he wanted this man so  _ bad.  _ This was beyond humiliating, his thirst.

“Jack, calm down. Trust me when I tell you, she’s fine. She’s definitely on our side. I can assure you of that. We’re spies. She knows we’re spies, and she knows we’re  _ good _ . If we want, we can track her family line up 6 generations if we wanted. I understand your apprehension, but we need her, and she needs us, though she’d rather die than admit it.”

Jesus Father Lord his  _ voice:  _ smooth as silk, warm as a pretty spring day. Jack felt like he was about to orgasm on the spot if he continued talking. He nodded as best as he could with his chin still in Gabriel’s hand, and Gabriel smiled at him, letting go of his chin and moving away, finally allowing him to breathe, and with the new flow of oxygen in his brain he hoped he could will his current erection away.

“I doubt McAfee is going to know about this, I mean, the impromptu meeting between you and our hacker?” What excuse would he have for his voice being hoarse? He cleared his throat. He really hated it when his body betrayed him.

“She doesn’t have to know about anything, until we have substantial proof that she’s on our side,” Gabriel said, going back to his previous position. “I just wanted to let you know because you’re my partner, my colleague and you deserve to know. I don’t owe McAfee jack shit.”

Jack looked at his hands, sure his face looked like a ketchup bottle, smiling softly. He knew he was a good agent, definitely one of the best (after Gabriel) in Blackwatch, but it really was something else altogether to be complimented by the man himself, the actual legend. The fact that he considered him a partner and a colleague was much more meaningful to him on a personal level than anything else anyone else would ever tell him. For the best in his craft to put him on the same level as him...it made his heart glow and his body all fuzzy.

Of course there were other insignificant things like thirst and his well known crush on him, but that was besides the point at the moment.

He nodded, finally standing up. His boxers didn’t feel as uncomfortably tight as before, so at least that was a good thing. “Well, time to go for the meeting. It’s been two weeks. I think we’ve got a lot to catch up on.

…

‘A lot to catch up on’ turned out to be one of the biggest understatements so far.

It was after work hours, and Gabriel had requested the use of a room with teleconferencing facilities and invited Jack to come over. Madeleine and Sombra said they could get their own facilities, and it took  them all a grand total of about three minutes to connect with each other. Sombra, at Ana’s request decided she was going to show herself, but she said that this was the only time they were going to see her.

It was interesting to see their varied reactions because for Gabriel, she looked somewhat what he expected, didn’t look at all what Jack expected, and Madeleine was shocked she even existed.

She was young, very beautiful, and purple seemed to be her theme colour. Her hair, makeup and nails were all purple, and her dark skin was very smooth, almost flawless. She had an air of mischief about her, and she never hesitated to show her exuberant youth. She honestly looked a lot more carefree than she should have, having absolutely no care in the world and going by her day to day life as if she had none of the worries the rest of normal mortals did.

However, Gabriel could tell, even from their previous interaction, that behind all this was a young woman who had been hurt, probably betrayed, and she was looking for justice. Probably vengeance, but that would be too strong of a word. Someone that was looking for vengeance would be angry. There was no anger here, just determination, grit, tenacity, resolve.

Perhaps pettiness. He allowed himself a small smirk. Ana was right. They would get along very, very well.

He turned to Jack, who, though face neutral, he could tell he was still trying to figure out whether or not he trusted this young woman. “Alright, ladies and gentleman, let’s begin.”

They begun with Jack giving information of what was going on on his end. There was a lot of exchange of currencies going on, but in particular they seemed to be focusing on the Euro. There was a little with the Pound and the Yen, and almost nothing with the Dollar, but the Euro was in almost all of their paperwork, even in transactions outside Europe.

“Probably illegal money, they are trying to move it around, get it out of the continent to increase paperwork,” Madeleine said, scrolling through the documentation that Jack had sent everyone. “That would explain the Dollar and Yen purchases. Are they exchanging this money in Europe or outside it?”

“In Europe mostly,” Jack said. “They move it through a couple of countries in the EU Zone then exchange it in either London, Paris or Frankfurt, then take it out, either in Dollars or Yen.”

“Definitely illegal money. None of it is passing through Zurich?”

“Money no. Assets, yes,” Gabriel said, feeling this was when he could get in. Everyone’s attention turned to him. He promptly went on to explain that every single asset these people had bought in the middle East - and they were many - the transaction had always, without fail, passed through Zurich. It’ was very interesting because there were two Arabic individuals, one of whom was a woman who were mentioned in every single transaction, and there was also a name that Gabriel found that stood out in the Zurich transactions, and when he dropped it, only he and Jack managed to keep a straight face.

“Sombra,” Gabriel said, watching her head perk up as he addressed her. “I want every single detail about this bitch.  _ Everything.  _ I want her schedule, her work, her social media, fuck, get me her gynacologist’s licence number if it’s gonna be relevant. I want  _ every. Single. Fucking. Detail.” _

“On it,  _ jefe.” _

“Madeleine, I want a meeting. Business meeting with her. The second she touches down in this country I wanna meet her. Jack and I have some few words to exchange with her. Bullshit an excuse.”

“Got it.”

He disconnected the call, turning to Jack, who had made a face.

“Can we have at least an hour break?”

Gabriel smiled. “Sorry blondie. You’re the one doing all the talking. We all know how Petras regards people that look like me.”

Jack’s face immediately turned into rage. “Petras is a fucking idiot.”

“Exactly. Which is why  _ you’ll  _ be the one talking to him. I don’t trust myself to not roast him when we need his corporation.”

“I’m not paid enough for this shit,” Jack mumbled, preparing himself.

“No amount of compensation known to mankind, monetary or not, can be enough to deal with Petras,” Gabriel responded as he connected the call.

It took a long time, before the call was answered, something that was quite uncharacteristic. Petras almost always answered his calls at about the second ring, and by the thirst ring his secretary would answer and say that he was unable to answer the call at the time and if they wanted they could leave a message and he could get back to them later. Today he answered at the sixth call, and Gabriel and Jack exchanged a look. That was something interesting that they could look at later.

“Petras,” he snapped. As usual they got him when he wasn’t in a good mood.

“Director,” Jack said, in the smooth, confident tone of his that he used when he needed to be diplomatic. “Agent Reyes and I are currently in Asia investigating some very suspicious activity and we needed to enquire something from you.”

Petras’ beady eyes stared back at them, arguably blank, but who knew when they were buried around all that flesh in his face.

“WHere in Asia are you?” he asked slowly.

“Classified,” Jack promptly responded. “It’s just there have been some transactions that have passed through Zurich, specifically one of Overwatch’s main banks, and according to these transactions they have overwatch’s approval on them, and since you’re the only person that can sign off these transactions, we wanted to confirm that you were the one that had in fact approved of them or if there is something more sinister going on.”

Petras was silent for a while. “What kind of transactions?”

“Financial transactions,” Gabriel said before Jack responded. “Buying and selling of shares and companies.”

“You need to be a lot more specific with which area of Asia in particular. Asia is a large continent, very multicultural.” He was really desperate to evade giving them a straight answer, which made them even more suspicious.

Gabriel rolled his eyes. Asia was only multicultural when it was convenient for these fucking racists. “I’m afraid we can’t tell you that, Director. Overwatch’s safety is very dependent on us maintaining as much secrecy as possible during this mission.”

Petras still remained silent, eyeballing them. “Yes in the recent past there have been some transactions that I’ve approved in Asia. I only with you could be more specific so that I can tell you more information.”

“I’m afraid that will have to do, Director. Thank you,” Jack said, immediately hanging up and turning to Gabriel.

He was definitely in on this. Oh boy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I'm not being too obvious. I'm sorry if I am.


	5. First Target

Oh. Now this was interesting, probably one of the perks of the job.

Gabriel was trying very hard not to smirk, and from what he could see of Jack, he wasn’t alone. Speaking of Jack, he was looking absolutely  _ stunning  _ in that charcoal black suit. As usual he had gone all out, three piece suite with a double breasted jacket, and Gabriel was sure those trousers were so well ironed they could probably stand on their own. He was also sure he could see his future with how polished the shoes were, with an equally black shirt and a blood red tie. Gabriel had internally drooled, swallowing thickly when he first saw him, and he wasn’t quite sure whether he prefered him with or without those clothes, since either way he was hard at the respective thoughts.

He turned to their host, impressed by her cool demeanor. Zaina Karim was her name, a very influential one, according to their research, particularly in the financial circles in the Middle East. She was dressed in a dark grey suit, with an ash grey shirt and a black Hijab. Her skin was smooth, quite pale, no makeup, soft brown eyes, almond shaped, oval shaped face, relatively full lips, small nose, not quite as pointed but not quite flat either. Perfectly manicured hands, with two golden rings that probably cost some people’s mortgages on her right middle finger and ring finger respectively were in front of her on her desk, black leather high heels. She was simple and sophisticated, showing class but also showing she was very wealthy. She had the mannerisms and the aura to prove it.

“Goodmorning, gentlemen. My apologies for keeping you waiting. Please, have a seat.” Impeccable English, though relatively thick accent. Gabriel and Jack both relayed their thanks, taking their respective seats after she did, in front of her desk. She crossed her hands in front of them. “What can I do for you today?”

Gabriel leaned forward, telling her about some transactions that the Qatari government was raising question marks on because of the frequency and sheer size of them. He also made it a point to mention how Jack was having a little bit of a hard time doing his job, trading for the bank optimally because of the volume of currency flowing in, particularly from Europe. The Euro was a rising currency, and it was one that was being traded a lot and to have the Qatar Central Bank asking for clarifications and also asking him to wait as they investigated some of these transactions would incur some losses for the bank, and that, Gabriel noted, was not exactly what shareholders would want to hear.

Jack was trying very hard to focus on what Zaina and Gabriel were talking about, but he was finding it  _ exceptionally  _ difficult. Gabriel was one day going to kill him if he continued like this. Today he had worn a royal purple suit, deep and rich, contrasting very well with his lavender shirt and his beige tie. Jack highly doubted if there was any word in the English language that would give credence to just how downright sexy he looked today, with polished shoes that could reflect sunlight. He found himself looking between Zaina and her flawless skin and his own hands, because he was sure if he even glanced at Gabriel he would probably orgasm on the spot.

He tried to remember the information they had received from Sombra about her from last night, to distract himself from thinking about what gabriel dick print would look like through his boxers. She was married to Petras, which was extremely shocking to hear at first, because she was about thirty years younger than him. Not only that, but just from looking at their lives on paper, they really didn’t seem to have much in common. In fact the only thing that they seemed to have in common was that they both came from very wealthy, upper middle class families. Petras’ mother was model, and later socialite after marriage to his father, a high ranking political advisor and business man in Italy,  whereas Zaina was a distant relation to the Qatari Royal family, distant enough for not many people to know, but also not too distant that she wouldn’t benefit from their wealth and influence.

Obviously then, their marriage was a business arrangement, one of convenience to both families, but what exactly did this arrangement entail, and how would it stand to benefit either of them, both of them or their families? It didn’t make any sense whatsoever, unless there were other parties involved.

“Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Mr Reyes,” she said, addressing Gabriel, her soft-spoken voice bringing Jack back to focus.  “I’ll be sure to get in touch with the Central Bank. However, I would like to ask both you and Mr Morrison here for a favour,” she said. Gabriel simply nodded at her, as Jack looked over to her as well.

“I need both of you to write official letters, laying out exactly where your issues are so that I can present them with my argument. I can assure you that I will smoothen things out for you and you’ll be able to continue with your work. I honestly apologise for any inconvenience caused.”

Gabriel flashed her a dazzling smile, showing his straight, white teeth, and Jack noticed how her face immediately went red, though she admirably kept her face straight. “Of course, ma’am,” he purred smoothly. “I and Mr Morrison here appreciate your efforts, and the time you’ve taken to see us. Please excuse us, however, we need to get back  to work.”

Zaina opened her mouth, but closed it moments later when she was unable to say anything. She nodded, prompting another smile from Gabriel, then one from Jack, who walked out. Jack couldn’t help it.

“Really turned on the charm there, didn’t you?” He didn’t mean to be bitter, but even he could hear it leaking out of his voice, and deep down he knew  _ exactly  _ why.

Gabriel chuckled, the warm, masculine sound igniting a roaring fire at the pit of Jack’s belly. He bit his tongue to stop some embarrassing sound or other from leaving his lips. He really needed to check himself. “Jealous, Morrison?”

“Not really. I just thought some of your antics were unnecessary.” He was blindingly jealous, actually.

“Well, these alleged unnecessary antics have gotten us far more information than we would have received had we been all formal with her. Keep the recordings and bring them out later when we’re talking to Sombra. It should be of use to her to find out Karim’s contact in their Central Bank.”

Jack nodded, pocketing and walking in comfortable silence until they got to Gabriel’s office. He was about to say his goodbyes and leave before he was pulled into Gabriel’s office, the back of his hand against those full lips, the goatee tickling his skin. Most of Jack’s blood drained from his brain straight to his dick.

“Thank you for the information you provided,  _ gatito.  _ I really appreciate the work you’re doing, and I appreciate you’re the one assigned to me on this mission. It makes me sleep easier at night knowing that I’m working with one of the most competent agents in the organisation. We just could finish this work in the tight time frame we’ve been given,” Gabriel murmured, lips moving against his hand. His face was probably as red as Zaina’s earlier, and he nodded frantically, before asking for his leave and relatively calmly walking out. He needed relief.  _ Desperately.  _

_ … _

Jack honestly didn’t know how he got here so fast, but the second he got out of Gabriel’s office he dashed straight to the washroom, running into a stall and locking himself in. His dress pants and boxers were uncomfortably tight, and as he panted, the back of his head against the door, trying to get himself in order, his fingers twitched behind his back, eyes closed tight, wondering if a few deep breaths and thinking about that atrocious paper work waiting for him would somewhat ease his erection.

It didn’t.

He took a glance down at his crotch, and, well, it was pretty obvious. His hand still tingled, and he could still feel Gabriel’s lips against them, the goatee tickling him, his breath on them as he spoke and he moaned, loudly, shamelessly, not caring whether or not he could be heard. God...he didn’t know whether he should curse or praise the man for doing this to him.

Gabriel wasn’t touchy feely, and he wasn’t one to hand out compliments lightly. He also never bullshitted people, and for the most part was very forthright and straightforward. But Not only had he complimented Jack, on both his partnership and his competency, called him a term of endearment and  _ kissed his hand... _ all those actions just drove Jack wild.

He swallowed again, before reaching for his pants, popping the button and pulling down his fly, his thumb at the waistband of both his pants and his boxers and his cock sprung out, hot, hard and thick, flushed red and already leaking. “Fuck,” he hissed to himself, grinding his teeth together as he grabbed his dick, his hips bucking into his hand as he stroked himself once. He really wished he had some lube, but he felt his own seed spill onto his dick, on his palm, and he decided he was just going to make do with what he had. He increased the pace of his thrusts, nearly whimpering with pleasure, as his mind brought up thoughts of Gabriel naked, behind him, face buried in his neck as he kissed him, fucking him almost gently from behind, his thrusts smooth but deep, thorough, primal, alternating between telling him the sweetest and most filthy things.

Jack snarled, his hand moving so fast up and down his dick, leaning forward, supporting himself with his hand on the cistern of the water closet in front of him. He felt his balls tighten, his toes curling in his shoes, liquid heat spreading all over his body. He knew he was close, it was going to be soon, and with a quiet whine of Gabriel’s name he came, still stroking himself and watching his seed spill into to the loo, as his hips twitched erratically and he panted, trying to regulate his breathing. With shaking hands he got some tissue and cleaned up everywhere, including himself and the loo, flushed, redressed, and walked out of the stall. He splashed water on his face, still slightly weak from his orgasm and walked back to his office. He had a lot of work to do.

…

“Oh don’t I have news for you concerning our new friend Ms Karim,” Sombra said later that evening, munching on popcorn as she peered into the camera at Gabriel and Jack. It was later on in their apartment, and they were gathered into the sitting room. Sombra had texted them both when they were at work, informing them that she had gotten some new info that might be relevant to their interests, in her words.

Gabriel nodded once at her, telling her to continue. She shifted in her chair, making herself more comfortable. “I got quite a bit on her, and it seems she’s in on this shit deep. I’m not sure whether this helps the Qatari Royal family, and I doubt it’s relevant, but if you want I can look into it,” she murmured, stuffing her mouth with popcorn. She had definitely gotten Gabriel and Jack’s attention.

“What do you have on her?” Jack asked, staring intently at her through the computer screen. Sombra brought up two screens, one with Zaina’s beautiful face, the other, with her information on paper.

“Zaina Karin is probably one of the most dangerous people in the Middle East. She’s very well educated, with a double degree from Yale Business School in Finance and Economics, and a Masters in International Finance from Cambridge. She’s also a highly trained assassin, specialising in the literal traditional way of the very first Nizari Ismailis, the only difference is that she does her work in private as opposed to them who did their assassinations in public.”

Gabriel and Jack stared back at her. She wasn’t sure whether they were surprised or not, but she knew she should continue. “She’s the one that suggested marrying Petras, probably to get some connections in Overwatch. I’m not particularly sure, but I know there are some Talon members in the United Nation, some in very high positions, but I’m not sure about Overwatch. I think it’s something you’re gonna have to discuss with your boss.”

Gabriel was contemplative. “Do you think she married Petras to use him to move these assets and this money much more easily? Because the UN normally does this, they buy assets in bulk, since they are never really sure when they will have money like this again. Yes, they rely on donations for member states, but when their elite are busy driving BMWs and Mercedes and Audis, it’s pretty obvious that they have other methods of making profits. It’s run by some of the most capitalistic states, so it’s obvious those beliefs have trickled down.”

All three of them were silent for a moment.

“That’s extremely likely. I think she might be in Talon, but we gotta talk to Ana about this,” Jack added, sighing. He could already feel the headache coming.

It was silent for a moment, as the three of them thought of just how entirely fucked the human race was. It was time to go to sleep. It was going to be a long couple of days, but such was the nature of their jobs.

…

Ana wasn’t quite sure whether to be elated or frustrated, so she chose indifference.

“I knew Petras was sketchy, but for his greed to drive him this deep into morally questionable status was something I never thought he’d go through. Honestly considering how weak willed he is it’s understandable  that he’s rise this hihg in the ranks of the UN, but this is, quite worse than I thought. Oh boy,” she murmured, rubbing the bridge of her nose to ease the tension there.

Gabriel and Jack shared a look, before Gabriel spoke. “We know there’s no bad news, but can you give us a bit of an idea of what exactly we’re dealing with here?”

Ana sighed. “I can bet my yearly income that Ms Karim definitely married Petras for the benefit of Talon, which explains why and how they have been managing to buy and move around such large amounts of money and assets across continents. The UN is the only organisation that’s allowed to do this across borders. Individuals, even corporates, no matter how powerful can’t do it at this speed or this volume because there’s financial risks involves, not to mention heavy regulations in different countries, particularly after the multiple financial crises that happened in the past. She organises the paperwork and talks to the people involved, he stamos and the stuff moves.”

It was silent for a moment.

“So Petra is in Talon?” Jack asked, his brow furrowing, scribbling notes into his notebook, same as Gabriel.

“Definitely. That was probably the basis of him marrying Karim. He had to join them as well, and considering how greedy he is, I’m sure he agreed to it in a heartbeat. He’s racist, but at the end of the day, his preferences on who he decided to assign humanities on are overridden by his need for material wealth, so he decided he might as well marry her, but have nothing to do with her physically. She probably feels the same way, because she’s significantly too gorgeous to find herself with his receding hairline, papier mache looking face.”

All three of them snorted, before Jack pointed out something that brought sober mood back. “So she’s the first one we gotta get rid of. Who’s the other one?”

Gabriel suddenly had an epiphany. “I think I know who it may be, but I need Sombra to do some research for me and go through my notes. Can we meet again in a couple of days?”

Ana sighed again, that bone tired one. This mission was really taking a toll on her. “Please don’t delay this Gabriel.”

Oh he wouldn’t, he promised himself. He definitely wouldn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jack is so thirsty LOL.


	6. Second Target

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> World building is hard TF...

“Please take care of her. We both know if Jack Or I tell her to take care of herself she’ll roll her eyes at us and roast us in Arabic. This mission is really taking a toll on her, not to mention she’s really worried about Fareeha’s education and well-being. You’re the only we all know who she can listen to and the only one we both can trust to actually take care of her. She needs a break from all this bullshit, even though it’s for a weekend. She not only has to deal with us and this mission but she also has to consistently deal with hiding this from the UN and Overwatch. We both know how overbearing Petras is, since he’s still so bitter he could never get her fired.”

The first thing Gabriel did when he got into his office the next morning was to call Reinhardt. As much as Ana had tried to hide how stressed she was about this mission, he had known her long enough to see how fatigued she was, and the external factors that seemed to be bothering her as well. She was a lot paler, bags under her eyes heavier and the lines around them also a lot more defined. He knew Ana was excellent at working under pressure and though she was only human and like everyone else could also crack if there was too much happening, it broke his heart to see her like this.

She didn’t deserve this bullhsit. None of them did.

Reinhardt Wilhelm, Ana’s husband had answered the call with his usual exuberance and enthusiasm, and though Gabriel was worried, he couldn’t help but feel unexplained joy whenever he interacted with the large man. You could never have negative energy around the man. He was too happy and hopeful for such things. However, when Gabriel informed him of how worried he was for his wife’s well-being he immediately became serious, promptly became serious, realising the gravity of the situation.

“Ah. Of course. Don’t vorry. I vill look after her. Just do your jobs and I vill do mine,” he responded immediately, saluting him. Gabriel smiled again, saluting back, before switching off the skype call and looking back at his notes.

He had snooped around a little bit, to see if Karin had anyone she reported to. With her portfolio, he would be very surprised if she did.

Well, life was really throwing a lot of things at him, wasn’t he? Perhaps he was reading a lot into this. It was time for him to consult with Jack. As he was making the call, he wondered if he’s get into trouble for being on the phone too much while at work. At least this time he had an excuse because it  _ was  _ for work, though it was much more different than they thought.

“Hey Gabe,” Jack said when he picked up the phone. His voice was slightly huskier today, and Gabriel had to close his eyes for a second, shift in his chair to calm down that feeling of arousal bubbling at the pit of his stomach. It wasn’t even eleven yet. He really needed to calm the fuck down. “What’s up?”

“There’s some notes I’ve got here that can help me with some work, but I don’t think I have all the information.” He paused here, using their secret channel to send the stuff about Karin to him.

“Mhmm,” Jack  said, immediately getting what Gabriel was saying.

“Can you have a look at them for me and maybe help me fill out the gaps?”

Jack was silent again for a moment, and seconds later a confirmation response popped up on Gabriel’s datapad, it being Jack confirming that he’s get the info and they’d discuss it later at home. 

“No problem, boss. I’ll get back to you tomorrow.”

“Thank you.”

Now, to wait.

…

There were at home, talking to a not-very-amused Sombra, which, in itself, was very amusing.

“It’s so rude when both of you bombard me with emails asking for the same thing then keep me out of the convo  _ forever  _ because apparently you’re discussing your super secret spy stuff,” she said, groaning as she stuffed popcorn in her mouth. Jack wondered just how much popcorn she consumes in a twenty four hour period, but was also knowledgeable enough to know that if he even dared to ask he’s be roasted within an inch of his life, so he kept his musings to himself.

Gabriel, on the other hand, rolled his eyes. Why was she so extra? “Stop being so dramatic,” he muttered. He noticed the pointed looks and raised eyebrows from both of them and ignored them. “What you got for us _ pequeñita _ ?”

It hadn’t taken Jack long do snoop around a little bit to find information on whether Karim had someone she was accountable to, and what he got surprised them both. They knew she was well connected to Talon and the Qatari Royal family, but they didn’t quite expect those particular connections to be  _ this  _ deep.

Ahmed ibn La’Asid was his name, and he was the first cousin of the current Emir (their fathers were brothers, with his own father being the younger brother to the former Emir). He was the current minister of internal security - one of the most powerful ministerial posts in the country - and he sat on the Talon council. Zaina was his niece, her father having married his sister. The marriage was, of course arranged - her father having lucked out in his business ventures and owned substantial shares in a lot of the oil rigs, banks and insurance companies in the countries - so his marriage to his sister was to keep that wealth as close to the Royal family as possible. Zaina was apparently born and brought up in immense luxury and opulence, and she seemed to have married into it as well. It seemed they had found their second target, but they needed more information. They needed tangible proof that this man was worth assassinating, which is where Sombra got into the picture.

Sombra shifted in her chair, implying that they were going to be there for quite a while. “I saw both your notes questioning yourselves whether you got the right people to get rid of, and I’ll have to tell you yes, you do. Both Karim and ibn La’Asid are the people on this side you need to get rid of if you wanna start crippling Talon. You already know about Karim, so there’s no point in me boring you to death repeating her information. Let’s talk about ibn La’Asid, and trust me there’s a lot to talk about.”

“He’s one of the most powerful Talon Council members - one of the five to hold veto power - and whenever he says ‘jump’ everyone else does and waits to be punished when they haven’t jumped high enough. He’s got it all: wealth, influence and the word. Even among the five veto holding members he still generates a fair amount of fear and respect. He literally owns all the emirs in the region. He literally controls the economies of this region, and before any financial decisions are made he  _ must  _ be consulted, or else whoever is responsible for implementing said decision will be assassinated, Qatari or not. You guys remember a couple of years ago there were a lot of powerful Middle Eastern politicians who were being assassinated everywhere, and all of them were killed in the exact same way? That was your girl Ms Zaina on the orders of your man here Mr La’Asid.”

Gabriel and Jack both whistled lowly, remembering how there was a near economic crisis that caused one of the worst, but shortest oil crises of the century. A decision was made by all the Central banks in the region to tighten some banking regulations that allowed movement of cash and very specific investment assets from outside the region. All respective governments were about to begin implementing these rules when the first victim, the Governor of the Central Bank of Bahrain was found murdered in his office, a vertical slash on his right jugular, his suit drenched in blood. The entire world was shocked, because there seemed to be nothing indicating that he had wronged anyone or had done anything wrong, even in his country to deserve to die like that. The Bahraini government declared they would investigate, but exactly seven days later, the Governor of the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates met the same fate.

It was always exactly seven days - regardless of when the day fell - that slowly, one by one, governors of Central Banks of the states that had allegedly agreed to implement these changes were murdered: all of them in their offices, all of them with a vertical slash on their right jugulars. No one knew which country was next, and governors begun resigning, absolutely terrified of their lives, and no one wanting to take their place before the killer struck again, this time on the resigned governor of the Omani central bank. His body was found in his former office - an office that was already occupied, in fact it was the  _ current  _ governor that found his predecessor’s lifeless body when he was getting to work the next day - and called the police. It was then that governments figured out it wasn’t  _ the office  _ that this killer had a grudge against, but the  _ individuals.  _

Despite these planned assassinations having patterns similar to those of a serial killer, the local police could never solve this mystery, even when the police forces banded together across the region, the still could not figure out who did it. No one knew how to stop the Bank Administrative killer, as they were then called, but the moment countries started pulling back the bank restrictions, the killings stopped. It’s like they never even happened, like it was all a nightmare and about nine individuals who just wanted to do their jobs and create the policy they thought would be best for their countries were slaughtered like chickens.

It now turned out that Talon was behind it. Upper echelon Talon members would lose a lot of money and investments if these regulations passed through, and talking to governments wouldn't work. So why tell when you could show?

“He’s extremely ruthless when it comes to making sure Talon stays in the shadows and that they achieve their ultimate objective of making the rest of the human race literal slaves, and he expects nothing but unquestionable dedication, discipline and loyalty for everyone that works for him, and he would never hesitate to extend that ruthlessness even upon his council members. They obviously know this, so they sit on there in absolute fear of him and his feared assassin.”

“How many  of them know that Karim is the assassin?” Jack asked, already having a vague idea of the answer.

“None of them. In fact the only people that know about Karim’s real profession, other than herself and La’Asid as the three of us. Even her family doesn’t know what she does in the shadows, though they know he’s her boss.”

Gabriel was thinking. “So we got our targets then?” Jack and Sombra nodded. “Alright. Let’s do this.”

It was show time.

…

Madeleine could count on one hand the number of times she had regretted her line of work, and this was most definitely one of those times.

“Are you fucking  _ insane?! _ ” she screeched, her accent all the more pronounced as she slammed her hands on her desk, leaning forward to face Gabriel and Jack. The sting from her palms paled in comparison to the sudden racing of her heart.

“Apparently,” Gabriel responded, much more sedate, looking her dead in the eye. He made sure his voice was soothing. Someone needed to be rational in the pandemonium that was about to be happening. “To be in this line of work you need a significantly higher degree of insanity than most people.”

“Do you know how fucking  _ difficult  _ it is to set up a meeting with La’Asid? It’s going to take me  _ at least  _ a fortnight.” She had left her desk, and was pacing up and down her office. The tension in her body evident from the dents her heels left in the carpet. The view here was pretty spectacular, Jack noted. “What fucking excuse am I even going to bullshit?”

Gabriel shrugged, watching with some kind of sadistic amusement as a series of emotions flashed through those brilliant, green eyes of Madeleine’s, despite her face staying exactly the same. 

She’d make an excellent agent with the proper training. Maybe when this bullshit was done he’d bring it up with Ana.

“Can you make it three weeks? Jack, Ana and I are going to need that exact time frame if this entire assassination is going to go without a hitch.”

Madeleine paused and stared at them, as if they were aliens that had just shed their skin in her office and there was shiny goo covering her carpets. Gabriel was having way too much fun watching her catapult from emotion to emotion like this, and so was Jack, come to think of it, who not only hadn’t said a single word since they walked into her office, but he could see the mirth in his eyes.

Madeleine took a deep breathe. “Let me get this straight,” she said slowly, looking at them, skepticism literally overflowing from her person. “You want me to set up an appointment for a business lunch with Zaina Karim and her boss Ahmed ibn La’Asid so that you can assassinate them because they are both a part of Talon?”

“Yep,” Gabriel nodded.

“And you’re both one hundred percent sure these assassinations will cripple Talon?”

“Yep.” This time it was Jack that spoke.

She still stared at them. Hard. “And if it doesn’t work?”

Both shrugged, but Jack spoke. “We’ll probably die and the human race will be doomed,” he said, so casually as he stared at Gabriel, who was calmly sipping his water.

Madeleine had given up. She walked to her desk and rummaged around for a key in her handbag. She then walked to a painting on her wall, moved it aside and opened up a safe, taking out a bottle of what looked like some excellent quality scotch, opened it, and took  a huge swig. Gabriel and Jack just stared at her.

“Can I have details? I don’t think I’m going to ask him to attend a lunch in thin air.” You could never have known just seconds ago she was debating whether she should just jump out this goddamn building and make herself a human pancake on the road below but had instead decided to see how fast she could kill herself through alcohol poisoning.

“Twelve hours. Also, be careful with that. We know the stereotype about the Irish, but we’re not quite sure about you Scots. You killing yourself through alcohol poisoning won’t do any of us any good.”

“Please get the fuck out of my office. And don’t forget the bloody details of this suicide mission.”

“That’s  _ near  _ suicide mission to you, excuse me. We both like to live a little. Talk to you later.” They sauntered out of her office as if they were on the way to the fair, even managing a small wave goodbye at her.

She was  _ not  _ being paid enough for this.


	7. The deed is done

“This better be good news.” Ana wasn’t looking amused at them, resting her left cheek on her left fist, elbow leaning on her office desk. The lines on her face seemed to have somewhat reduced, but she still looked a lot more fatigued than she normally did. Baby steps, however. It seemed that Reinhardt had talked to her.

Gabriel shrugged. “Well depends on your definition of good news, really. Jack and I just wanted to touch base and ask if you could call in one of your thousands of favours from back in the day.”

Ana narrowed her eyes, and for the first time in a really long time Gabriel was legitimately scared because he had no idea who exactly it was she was pissed off at. He just hoped it wasn’t him, because he  _ knew  _ Ana. Whoever that was on the receiving end of her rage would not live particularly comfortably for the next couple of weeks.

“Go on.”

“We found our two targets. We have a plan on how and when to assassinate them. We need your help with the where.” Gabriel spoke calmly, slowly as Jack subtly fidgeted next to him, his thumb constantly rolling over his fingers, and the muscle in his jaw ticking. Externally he looked like he didn’t even know why he was there, but Gabriel was a spy. He could see that Jack was trembling in his boots at the moment, and that kind of apprehension was pretty justified.

Ana, on the other hand, leaned forward on her desk, the lines of her annoyance on her face gone, replaced with a look of blatant skepticism. “I know that you both are exceptional agents, and you’re one of the handful of people that I trust with my life, and I know that I put immense time pressure on you to get this mission done as quickly and efficiently as possible, but you really want me to believe that you not only have figured out who your first two targets are, but you’ve come up with a plan to assassinate them? It’s been just a month.”

Jack glanced at Gabriel, who never looked back at him, but smiled slightly. Ana turned her attention to him, and Jack swallowed, before opening his mouth to speak. “Well, you did tell us that time was of the essence when we started this, so we’re trying to work as fast as possible. Sombra has also been particularly instrumental in helping out, but generally once you figure out who you need to take out, the rest of the pieces kinda fall into place, which kind of explains how we were able to solve everything real quick.”

Ana stared at them, eyebrow raised as she sipped what was no doubt some excellent quality tea. “Really.” Her voice was so flat and deadpan that the intended question actually sounded like a statement.

Gabriel and Jack brought her up to speed with everything that was going on, and her range of facial expressions were so hilarious that more than once they had stopped to actually laugh. She seemed impressed enough, however, which was exactly what they were going for, since they would be asking her for a monumental favour.

“Why hasn’t SOmbra told you anything?” Jack asked, honestly curious.

“Something about not wanting to communicate with the people that pay her. Personal rule, she claims. I can understand, objectively speaking considering her line of work and potential clients. She’s young and some idiot that underestimates her intelligence thinks they can intimidate her, then when they realise just how vulnerable they are to her they think they can buy her. For a hacker she’s really weirdly ethical, and I suppose I can respect that.” Ana said, shrugging. 

“Life experiences, probably. She doesn’t come from the highest of socio-economic areas of Dorado, and considering she was orphaned so you she likely learned a lot of things the hard way,” Gabriel said slowly. A sombre kind of silence descended on them.

“Anyway, what’s this favour you wanted?”

They were gonna be here a while.

…

The look on Ana’s face was a cross between being offended and being impressed. “Let me get this straight,” she begun, leaning back in her chair. “The two have found out that Karin and ibn La’Asid are the targets you need to get rid of to shake things up a little bit in Talon. Karim is ibn La’Asid’s assassin, and both of them are responsible for the string of assassinations of governors of central banks in the Arabian peninsula a couple of years ago, and ibn La’Asid is almost literally single handedly handling Talon?”

Gabriel nodded. “More or less. We honestly have no reason to doubt Sombra, and going by this info she’s given us, it’s pretty obvious that if ibn La’Asid is gone, then there’s gonna be major panic on Talon elite. The Arabs don’t trust easily, and if they are gonna need a representative from the region, they need to have to interact with all the Emirs there, and this dude is very close to all the UAE Emirs. There’s not a chance they are going to get someone as powerful and influential as him as a replacement, so that already will be a weakness, not to mention when whoever replaces him - if he’s even replaced - joins the board he has to be informed of everything that’s happening,  _ and then  _ earn their trust. Jack and I are confident that these are our guys.”

“Don’t forget that he holds veto power. The veto holding members are from the five major languages of the UN, so they  _ must  _ get an Arab to replace him, and then they must train him and apply the veto to him. Talon are procedural, because that’s how they weed people out. As Gabe said, Arabs don’t trust easily, and there’s already most likely going to be some conflict brought about by the entire slew of unnecessary process that he’ll have to be taken through, so even from the start there’s going to be cracks and weaknesses that can be exploited. And how we plan to do this nobody else should know, except the people who will be directly involved, which is, essentially the four of us, including Sombra. As far as all the other parties are concerned, this is a Blackwatch mission.”

Ana looked between the two of them again. “Are you two paid enough for your work?”

Both Gabriel and Jack rolled their eyes. “Obviously not.” Gabriel said, almost submissive. “Benefits are pretty good, though.”

“Very well then, tell me what you need from me.”

The plan involved a friend of Ana’s from her days in the Egyptian military, who ran an extremely successful restaurant in downtown Doha, on one of the more popular hotels. It was definitely upper class, as it was one of the very few places that was almost always hosting heads of state and the respective royal families of the region, and their food was valued very highly by food critics and chefs alike. It was also one of the very few none-Western owned and operated restaurants that was licensed to sell alcohol to the patrons.

They needed to use the restaurant to carry out their assassinations, which was going to happen via food poisoning. They were to use an organic poison developed by Blackwatch that killed the patients by inducing a heart attack, and the promptly being broken down into harmless proteins and absorbed into the bloodstream before the victim died and had their bodily functions shut down. Since this was only known within Blackwatch, they needed Blackwatch operatives all over the restaurant for that particular day, where  _ everyone  _ was going to be a blackwatch agent, from the chefs to the waitstaff to the security. The poison would be administered by an expert, who would be masquerading as one of the chefs and most of the wait staff would be the clean up crew: the people who would ensure that all traces of Gabriel and Jack would be completely eliminated, whereas the rest of them would be feeding information back  to Ana, so that she can know what to give Petras when it eventually hit him that his wife and her benefactor, who doubled up as his true boss were dead, poisoned. 

Gabe was sure Ana’s face was stuck in place. Maybe they shouldn’t really have unloaded all this info on her at once. She was truly at a loss for words, a rarity if he was being honest.

“How do you know they’ll eat the food?”

That was all on Sombra, Jack started explaining. They had chosen this restaurant because they knew that ibn La’Asid really liked it, and he indulged himself there at least once every week, sometimes even to discuss things with Karim, and they knew that she had sung some of their praises to him, so they knew he would not decline an invite to a lunch there. She was still researching his favourite meal, and once they got that information they would immediately relay it back to the particular agent in charge of it, and it was then that she would be able to figure out how she would mix the poison in the meal, same case with Karim.

Ana was chuckling kind of incredulously at this point. “You know I’m still in such disbelief that you guys managed to get all this stuff done in such a short time frame. When will you send me specifics so that I can send Deen?”

Jack shrugged. “I mean, they made it kind of easy for all of us. There was such an abundance of information already there for us to comb through that we really got what we needed all the time.” He glances at Gabriel, who nodded once at him to continue. “We should be done with everything by about ten this evening, our time.”

Ana nodded. “I’ll have all this organised by tomorrow afternoon. You should have these guys dead by the end of the week.”

It was show time.

…

Honestly, Ana had really outdone herself this time.

There was not a single person in this restaurant that Gabriel couldn’t recognise, and all of them,  _ every single one of them  _ made it very clear who they were to both of them and their role in this entire operation. They were so well trained in the actual running off the restaurant, it was like they were the actual staff that was always there.

Now, of course how the restaurant looked now, in this time hours before the big act isn’t where Ana’s organisational skills and general prowess shows itself, it’s the planning that went through to make this day,  _ this day. _

Ana hadn’t even bothered mincing words. She had immediately called the guy up and told him they needed a restaurant to do an assassination (not  _ murder,  _ excuse her,  _ assassination)  _ and that he should pay his workers their normal wage and not the Blackwatch folks. They then had pictures and videos of the entire restaurant sent to them, both live and plans, and every last square foot of the place was studied and analysed. After than Ana specifically hand picked every single person that would be sent to prep and work for the day, and with them , worked to figure out the roles. Blackwatch then flew them out from Zurich to Doha, where they liaised with the actual staff of the place, until they knew and understood the whole place back to front.

Afterwards they got to planning the food, the specials of the day, and how they would be served, what Gabriel and Jack and would eat, and drinks. They figured out the poison to be administered and how they would be administered. Then of course, there would be the aftermath of the poisoning. Sombra had gone ahead to find out the GP he goes to, and after bribing the man right through the nostrils, combined with subtle threats (greedy men all had the same weakness: cowardice) ironically, with La’Asid’s own money, when SOmbra had hacked into his multiple accounts and funnelled varying amounts of cash from a variety of accounts, managed to “borrow” his clinic for the day, and put a Blackwatch agent in his place, a fully trained doctor, specializing in toxicology, who would ensure the toxins were really working in La'Asid and Karim’s bloodstreams, and after their deaths would flush the toxins out, and leave symptoms of cardiac arrest.

Madeleine, it turned out, had the easiest job of them all. Ibn La’Asid and Karim had been in a jolly good mood, recently, more so than normal. He had actually  _ smiled  _ at people, and had been more than enthused to find out how people were doing in their lives, and ibn La’Asid was a little bit of a meme where the more jovial his mood the easier he was to get in touch with.

When she made the phone call he had been more than happy to go to lunch, to meet the two individuals who had been more than instrumental in ensuring a lot of his (and Talon’s) transactions had been smooth recently. In fact he even wondered why they had not been introduced before. After this lunch he would take it upon himself to give them a small treat. Such hard work and dedication to the growth of financial services in the region needed to be rewarded handsomely, and he would personally see to it that Mr. Reyes and Mr. Morrison would see the fruits of their labour.

Gabriel was little more subtle about it, but he couldn’t help buch chuckle a bit when Jack actively rolled his eyes and snorted. “Pity we won’t get to see the alleged fruits of our labour, since the fucker is gonna be dead, but he doesn’t know that.”

Which is what to this moment, La’Asid not able to stop grinning and Karin seated next to him, not quite smiling herself but she was in a pretty good mood herself.

“It’s honestly such an honour to meet you. Ms Karim has really been singing your praises, and the moment Miss McAfee had contacted me and asked me on your behalf to have lunch with you both who was I to refuse?” He asked, voice filled with joy.

Ahmed ibn La’Asid was a big man, tall and bulky, and though to the normal eye he could be described as fat, Gabriel and Jack knew better. It was in his stature and his gait. He stood straight as a pole, and his gait was short but quick steps, like he was always taking a brisk walk.

He was dressed in the traditional Arabic attire, though still slightly informal. He was even doubly impressed when he had arrived and found Gabriel and Jack already there, patiently waiting for them to arrive. Madeleine had sent her apologies of not being able to make it. She apparently had some work she needed to do, but for the ‘next lunch’ she would be sure to turn up.

Not that there would be one but that was besides the point.

Lunch went on pretty flawless. The wait staff (or Overwatch agents, really) had been here two weeks before hand, thoroughly trained in how to run this particular restaurant did a very phenomenal job and after lunch (he had tipped very generously, which was going to go the best performing member of staff as decided by the owner) everybody went home.

Within four hours after that lunch Gabriel and Jack were out of the country, on their way to Zurich. Now, for pandemonium.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Cue dramatic music* Leggo


	8. The First time

Ana had absolutely no idea what to do with these men. Even Rein was something between confused, appalled and impressed, he wasn’t quite sure yet.

“I knew both of you weren’t quite sane, which would explain your brilliance in this line of work, but I never quite thought you’d be batshit fucking insane,” she said, watching about three screens at the same time, switching between news channels as Gabriel and Jack sat very comfortably in her office chairs, sipping mojitos.

It had been about four days since the big event, and at the time it was just barely twenty four hours after Ahmed ibn La’Asad, major financial advisor to the Emir of Qatar and board director at Qatar National Bank and Zaina Karim, a very high ranking manager also in the Qatar National Bank were found dead in their respective homes of cardiac arrest. Postmortems on their bodies had already been conducted and nothing indicating any foul play had been found in their systems. Their hearts had simply given out in their sleep, followed by their blood pressure plummeting which is what caused the heart attacks. It was said that both of them had been undergoing intense pressure at their respective jobs, and this stress, according to the state coroner, is what had caused their deaths.

“What did you bribe him with?” Jack asked, playing with the mint in his glass.

“I knew him from back in the day. Dodgiest motherfucker alive, in that region and the only reason he’s even the state coroner is because he was fucking the Emir’s niece. I just called him and told him to shut the fuck up or deeds of his crimes during the Oil Crisis would ‘accidentally’ find their way to all major international media houses, including Al Jazeera, which he has a twelve percent stake in.”

Jack stated at Ana for a hot second as she casually mentioned how she blackmailed a literal state coroner and swallowed. “Remind me never to piss you off.”

Ana smiled, that terrifying sweet smile of hers. Jack was sure he felt some nerves tense. “You know better than to piss me off, Jackie. We’ve worked together long enough.”

“Where’s ibn La’Asad’s and Karin’s doc?” Gabriel asked, cheeky smirk on his face, already knowing the answer.

Ana waved her arm dismissively, as the other one still flipped through the news channels, showing that she didn’t give quarter a fuck and a bucket of three day old goat shit about him. “Somewhere in the Alps probably, enjoying the cash that would most likely constitute his paycheck for the next year and a half or so. I had to squeeze a lot of Overwatch money in his account using the dummy ones you set up. Sombra is such a darling and deleted them for me, fixing up the paperwork to cover it, bless her.”

Gabriel and Jack exchanged a look. They doubted in their career they would ever meet a woman as terrifying as Ana Amari.

“Why Overwatch money though?” Gabriel asked, tentative.

“Partly because I hate Petras and partly because the UN will replace it within a fortnight.”

Yes, definitely the scariest human being currently alive.

“I still cannot believe you managed to pull this off,”  Reinhardt said, as you now saw the financial news. QNB shares had fallen like a rock in a black hole, and there was a threat of a bank run happening. Investors has started panicking, and some had even pulled out together with their funds. It seemed like QNB would have to borrow money to stabilise themselves, and the Central Bank of Qatar would have to trade currencies to stabilise their currency. This would, in turn, slightly shake the financial position in the Middle east a little bit, and Talon was not going to have that. Not now, after they had invested so much in Qatar and by extension in the Middle East. They were going to have to move soon.

Jack shrugged. “You wanted pandemonium, we caused you pandemonium. Now all we gotta do is wait. Ibn La’Asid is not being replaced any time soon, so while they are having that headache, it’s time we relaxed, chilled out a bit and planned our next move, because they sure aren’t going to dilly dally.”

He wasn’t wrong, but now perhaps a celebration was in order, and by a celebration, they meant rest.

…

At Ana’s recommendation (she was snickering, which means it was going to be very soon), the boys returned to their quarters to get changed into much more formal wear. They had barely left their rooms when their respective holopads beeped frantically, signalling a very important and urgent meeting right that moment. Both of them smirked, because they were going to have a grand old time. Ana was not going to let him  _ breathe.  _

They got to his lobby slightly early, son they sat, and waited patiently, watching with unholy glee as his secretary ran up and down, only pausing on occasion to watch her wince when Petras yelled some expletive or other around her. Jack was one hundred percent sure Ana was recording it and sending it to her own secretary, and then they would both go laugh and laugh for a while about it. Both this secretary and Petras were all round horrible people,  and none of them felt any sympathy for them.

“The Director will see you now,” aforementioned secretary said to them in a small voice, too humiliated to look them in the eye. They all equally quietly said there thanks before walking into Petras’ office, and honestly speaking ‘a mess’ was a great understatement at what exactly was happening.

His jacket was on his chair, his desk a mess, papers strewn everywhere, coffee and cigarette stains all over the aforementioned desk and on the sides of it. If they would turn around to go and check they would probably find more stains around where his chair was. There was a tumblr of an amber brown liquid, most likely alcohol next to his computer, and he was pacing up and down behind his chair, tie loosened and his face, collar and shoulders drenched with sweat. He was mumbling things under his breath, and his hair may have been slightly less than it was the last time they say him. He paused his pacing once in a while to wipe at his face, but he never stopped sweating, and they were sitting in the office for about five or so minutes before he remembered he had called for them.

He stopped pacing and leaned forward on the table, gracelessly throwing himself on it, his meaty palms slapping it. “Amari, Reyes, Morrison, have you been watching the news?! Very prominent people in the Middle East were murdered!  _ Murdered!?  _ Right under our noses!”

Ana, Gabriel and Jack all just looked at him, as he dipped his head, sweat dripping onto the documents on his table. His hands were shaking.

“I don’t think it classifies as a murder when the state coroner on international television said it was a cardiac arrest, sir,” Jack said. It seemed like he added the ‘sir’ as an afterthought.

“But they were healthy. They were  _ fine.  _ How did that heart attack come from nowhere?”

“It never came from nowhere. The report said they were both overwhelmed with stress, which all four of us know is a pretty overwhelming thing to go through. It’s unfortunate because we don’t really know what caused stress of such a magnitude, since they rarely, if ever confided in anyone,” Ana said, her voice taking on a warm, comforting tone, which made Jack and Gabriel almost break their facades because that shit was so fake even master counterfeiters would be impressed.

Naturally, Petras was too self absorbed to notice. Gabriel prayed to whatever deity that was listening to never let him devolve to be this dense in his life.

Speaking of Petras, he was up again, pacing, sweating, and pausing on occasion to wipe off the sweat off his face, which was shining and was so damp might as well have dumped a bucket of water on him.

“They were great allies of ours. They really helped the United nations, speaking for us to support us politically and financially. It’s going to take a lot to get the Arabs on our side now.” He almost wheezed these words out. He was truly in a state because he was honestly talking about Talon but not many people would be any wiser. They would simply think he was talking about the United Nations, that he was truly concerned about the state in the Middle East.

Ana was about to open her mouth to excuse them - they had done their jobs here - when he turned to her again. “I need help. How can Blackwatch help?”

Ana raised an eyebrow. “I’ll see what we can do,” she said slowly. Petras stared at her for a few seconds more, his beady eyes literally dying, before he dropped his gaze and licked his lips, shaking right into his boots. He dismissed them, saying he needed time to be alone, to think.

“This is gonna be good,” Ana said, leaving Jack and Gabriel staring at each other as she headed straight to her office.

…

Jack’s life had been coming at him real fast recently. Not that he was particularly complaining but he also needed a break to process things. He was sitting on his couch in boxers and a t shit, eating a bowl of watermelons as he waited for Gabriel, nervous as all fuck, but also just a little aroused.

Just a little.

He shifted in his seat again, taking a deep breath as he shoved another spoon of the sweet fruit in his mouth. He left the spoon there, running his hands through his hair, pulling the spoon out and chewing slowly. Wild would be a massive understatement to describe exactly how today would turn out.

Gabriel had not even pretended to be subtle when he had called him. At first, Jack had thought that he had done something wrong and Gabriel was irritated, so when he saw that he was the one calling him he was psychologically preparing himself for an earful. But then Gabriel seemed very cordial, pleased even, when they were talking about random shit, and when Jack asked him what exactly was up, he nearly dropped his phone in surprise.

“Are you free this evening?” Gabriel had asked him, almost nonchalant.

“Yeah,” Jack responded, his heart rate increasing

“Good, because I wanna come over. I’d love it if you’d fuck me tonight”.

Jack at that point had lost all cognitive capacity, his mouth wide open, his throat dry, and his loins on fire. Gabriel patiently waited for him to rediscover the great wonders of speech.

“Uh, yeah, sure thing. I’ll, um, be done at about seven thirty. You can come after then,” Jack somehow managed when his brain decided to wanted to function again.

“Of course, Jackie. See you then.”

He hang up before Jack could register that he was going to be fucking the great Gabriel Reyes that evening, since the only thing his mind was fixated on was how his voice dropped and sounded significantly more sultry when he bid him goodbye.

His dick twitched in his pants again and he made himself swallow (heh, swallow) the last of his watermelon to blatantly ignore it. He had just taken his bowl to the sink when he heard a knock on his door. Well, this was it. He took a deep breath and went to open for Gabriel.

He actually squeaked when he saw Gabriel standing there, in basketball shorts and a black sleeveless shirt and Adidas sandals. He had honestly never seen a man more sexy in his life.

“Evening, Jackie. May I come in?” Gabriel asked him, the mischief in his smirk being mirrored in that baritone of his. Jack was sure his cock was gonna rip his boxers.

“Uh, yeah, hey Gabe. Sorry, please come in,” Jack responded, moving so that his guest could follow him in. It took him about thirty seconds to realise he hadn’t closed the door because he was staring at Gabriel’s bum. He followed him in and saw that Gabriel had found his way into his room and was standing, pocketing, waiting for Jack to offer him a place to sit down.

Jack raised his eyebrow at him, smiling slightly. “Really?”

Gabe shrugged, chuckling. “It’s rude to sit unless you’ve been told to.”

“I honestly don’t understand why you think ‘sitting’ is what I agreed to, because I have every single intention to tell you strip and get on my bed with your ass up because I want to eat it.”

The words had flown out of his damn mouth before he could close it. What the fuck had happened to his brain to mouth filter? Had he actually said those words? WHat kid of level of thirst had he ascended to now? He felt the heat emanating to his face, and he was one hundred percent sure the only reason his heart was beating that fast was because it was trying to remove some of that blood and take it to the rest of his body.

And by the rest of his body he meant his dick.

As he was having his internal monologue, his thoughts came back to the present and Gabriel had acquiesced, and there he was, naked on his bed, ass up, his face buried in the pillow. Jack was already uncomfortably hard and he hadn’t even done anything. WIth shaky hands he stripped himself, half hard and trying to control himself as he walked towards the bed, ogling shamelessly.

No clothes would ever do justice to just how absolutely stunning Gabriel Reyes was.

His skin was smooth, glowing, taut over his muscles. Aforementioned muscles weren’t bulky or over the top, but lean, streamlined, very well developed. Jack knew to be a competent agent you had to be excellent at hand to hand combat, and he could tell that Gabriel could snap someone in half given the chance, including him. He was a strong man, obviously, but he was more built for speed and agility as opposed to brute strength. Gabriel was nothing but pure,  unadulterated muscle,  _ especially  _ his thighs. Jack was sure he was going to die.

His throat, especially chose the most inappropriate time to go dry when he saw his dick, half hard, hanging between his legs, his tip flushed. Lord save him.

He lsowly walked towards the bed, trying to generate some form of moisture in his mouth, watching Gabe clutch on the sheets like his life depended on it (he was particularly proud of that) and without wasting any time proceeded to grab his cheeks and quite literally, shove his face in there.

Gabriel  _ moaned,  _ long, loud, uninhibited and absolutely shameless. Jack wasn’t exactly sure what was causing his blushing, but that was honestly one of the most arousing sounds he’d heard in his life, and he’d had a great life showing his face up past lovers’ bums, and having said lovers faces up his bum. _ None _ of them had ever made him feel like this, that he could say with confidence. When he passed his tongue over the surface of Gabriel’s hole he felt the man actually shaking, so he continued, slow, firm methodical strokes, clutching the firm muscle of his cheeks with such force he was sure they’d colour, despite his skin tone.

Gabriel was dead, gone, straight into the realm of ultimate pleasure. Where the  _ fuck  _ had Jack learnt how to do that?! Lord he was so hard it was almost painful, he was clutching these sheets with so much force he was expecting them to tear at any second, his  _ entire body  _ was shaking, and he was sure he was leaking terribly. This man was going to end him. Just  _ end  _ him. No past sexual partner had brought him to orgasm via rimming and Jack Morrison was probably going to be the first one. He could barely think straight. All his mind registered were the stroked of Jack;s tongue, his body imploding with heat from the inside, and this incredible need to take Jack’s dick fully. He needed to communicate this somehow. Words. He needed those. He needed to turn the jumbled mess in his head into words and use his vocal cords to relay them using sound as a communication medium that humans used with each other.

“J-Jack,” he breathed, his voice low and rough, somehow through the sheets. Jack slowed, not exactly stopped, the intensity of his tongue literally inside his bum continued. Gabriel pulled a section of the sheets because pleasure this intense should be considered a torture method.

“Please, fuck me.  _ Now!”  _ It was a half plea, half demand, because Gabriel wasn’t sure he had ever wanted another man they way he wanted Jack right this second. He needed to feel his strokes. He didn’t even want lovemaking. Fuck that lovey-dovey shit. He wanted to be railed. Rawed. Slammed. He wanted this man to totally and utterly  _ destroy  _ him.

Jack, not exactly privy to Gabriel’s thoughts didn’t exactly know what was going on in that brilliant mind of his, but going by that body language, he knew enough to realise they wanted the same thing. ABout goddamn time too. The only thing that had stopped his wanking to the splending sight in front of him was clutching those equally splendid butt cheeks. Really, what was this man’s exercise regime? It couldn’t be limited to squats. Squats alone can’t give you an ass and thighs sculpted by Adonis himself.

So he flipped Gabriel over, who was so malleable at this time that he never resisted, and Jack couldn’t help but giggle a bit by him bouncing on his bed. He leaned forward to his bedside drawer and opened it, removing his lube. He slathered it on his fingers and put it back, as he pretended not to be so turned on Gabriel looking at him, biting his lip and spreading his legs open, the action so obscene Jack found himself praying for self control. He leaned in, promptly devouring Gabriel’s mouth, as he slowly slipped two fingers into him to stretch him.

Gabriel was having a grand time, his near orgasm experience notwithstanding. He thought Jack was extremely cute when he was pretending not to be looking at him when he was hoeing up for him, so when he immediately kissed him and slipped his fingers up his bum, he promptly wrapped his arms around those broad, pale shoulders and opened his mouth almost as wide as he did his legs and let himself go. He honestly couldn’t wait to be ravished by this man. It had been long overdue.

In fact, if felt as though Jack was taking his time when he slipped a third finger in, so Gabriel bit his lip, growling, and he felt that smirk grow. He was about to break off and tell him to hurry the fuck up, when in what seemed like a blur, the fingers were out and Jack had slipped in in one smooth stroke, his own cock dripping with the lube, and Gabriel felt like his limbs had liquified.

Jack was...somewhere. He didn’t know where, but he definitely didn’t want to leave this place, because Gabriel was incredibly tight, and he almost came right on the spot when he clamped down on him the second he went in. He paused for a moment, giving both of them some seconds, before he pulled out, slowly and thrust back in, slowly creating a rhythm, languid and sweet, but deep and hard. He opened his eyes to watch Gabriel and honestly the man was almost ethereal. His eyes were closed, mouth parted slightly, pure bliss written all over his face as he panted slightly, just enjoying himself, gripping Jack’s biceps like his life depended on it, taking Jack’s strokes like he was made for them.

And at this point Jack felt like his strokes were made for Gabriel. He wiggled his hand in between their bodies, reaching for his dick, long, thick and hard, and despite the fact that it took some time because Gabriel had ascended to heights of pleasure he never thought he could reach, he eventually managed to sync his hand stroking his lover’s cock with his own strokes in and out of him, and this time when he felt those phenomenal thighs tremble again, he highly doubted Gabriel would be able to hold back.

Gabriel’s everything turned to mush when Jack  hit his prostate with every stroke, that it took a couple of seconds to register that he was wanking him, those large rough hands stroking up and down his dick in rhythm with his strokes. It was honestly far too much, even with a man of his control and with a final whimper of Jack’s name, he came, spilling so much of himself all over them both, pulling jack to him and burying his face in Jack’s neck, as his whole body trembled and convulsed under him. This was one of the longest lasting orgasms he had had in a long ass time, and honestly it just had to be with Jack.

Watching the hottest man alive come for him was too much for Jack, his seed flowing down his hand onto his sleek abdomen, especially when said man pulled him down with an unexpected strength to bury his face in his neck as he came was what actually drove him over the edge, and he followed Gabriel into Nirvana, silling him so completely that all he could manage was collapse on top of him, as his hips shuddered for a couple of seconds, the longest orgasm of his life. He rolled over the side, snuggling into him, regulating his breathing, totally sated, but also totally exhausted.

“We’re a fucking mess,” Gabriel mumbled, his voice slightly rough as he gently brushed his hair. Jack snuggled closer, wrapping his arms around Gabriel’s torso.

“We’ll change tomorrow,” he said yawning, before blacking the fuck out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About fucking time, huh? I know.
> 
> God this was so, so long. I def think I went a little bit HAM, but gosh, they deserve it. They really do, and I'm so glad with how it turned out. Perhaps a little too descriptive? I mean, not that nay of your thirsty monsters will complain but I just wanted to make the consent and them enjoying themselves very very clear which is why it turned out to be 670 pages SMH.
> 
> Anyway, I'm babbling. The plot is thickening. Stay tuned.


	9. No rest for the weary

His bed was so warm and he really didn’t want to wake up. He honestly couldn’t remember the last time he slept this well, and he hoped he could sleep this well more in the future. He smiled, before attempting to stretch, and elaising there was something blocking him from stretching fully.

Frowning slightly, Gabriel opened one eye, ready to grumble for twenty minutes about who it was that was in  _ his  _ was in  _ his  _ bed, before he was overwhelmed with pale skin covering hard muscle before he remembered. He wasn’t in his bed. He was in Jack’s. They had sex last night and it was some of the best sex he’d had in a while. He shifted a little bit against him, and Jack, still asleep, shifted as well, tightening his arm around him and pulling him closer. Gabriel nearly giggled, but instead took the time to look at him.

He was still asleep, and he looked so peaceful, so calm. Despite the stubble and the messy blonde hair, he honestly looked like he was in his mid twenties, face smooth, no creases or lines, his mouth slightly open as he drooled on the pillow. His chest was slowly rising up and down, his hands reaching over to Gabriel, holding him close, subconsciously looking for the heat he was giving out. Gabriel gently touched his chest and the pale skin was warm, as he ran his hands over th little chest hair. He wanted to stay like this forever, just admire him, but they were a mess and he needed to leave before Ana found out.

“Jack,” he said gently, shaking his partner a little bit. Jack grunted. “It’s time to get up.”

Gabriel watched as Jack’s eyes fluttered open, staring at him blearily as he wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth. “Huh?” he seemed very confused. When he seemed to be somewhat awake, he smiled. “Oh, hey Gabe. Morning.”

“Good morning. I take it you slept well last night?” Jack blushed furiously at that, mumbling something under his breath. Gabriel chuckled, leaning in to kiss Jack on the lips. It was soft and intimate, but still deep, as Gabriel held the back of Jack’s neck, taking his lower lip in his mouth and growling when Jack moaned in response. Gabriel broke off, still smiling lecherously at Jack, who was dazed if anything.

“Let’s go take a shower. We’re both a fucking mess from last night. Come.”

Jack found himself being dragged into the shower, his heart beating as he wondered whether showering was the only thing they’d be doing. He also took the chance to look down at himself, as he saw the dried cum and sweat stuck on him, and he felt heat swirl at pit of his stomach as the memories of just how much they had both enjoyed themselves came crashing back to him. He also desperately needed to change the sheets, but that was something he’d think about later, when Gabriel was gone and after he’d wanked himself sore at how vocal he was. Then, he could properly relax and wait for their next Talon sub mission, and hopefully, do this again.

As he was going through his datapad, something popped into his head that he hadn’t given much thought earlier: what were they now? Obviously they were still colleagues, and over time they had become friends and they were slowly cultivating a relationship of trust with one another (or at least Jack  _ thought  _ they were cultivating a relationship of trust with one another). He was also very well aware that Gabriel Reyes had a personal policy of never sleeping with fellow agents or Overwatch and United Nations employees. He had seen those painfully brutal rejections whenever he’d been propositioned - and Gabriel had been propositioned  _ a lot  _ \- so he knew. Probably everyone in the organisations knew.

Yet he had willingly slept with him. In fact Jack could dare say that Gabriel is the one that encouraged them, knowing very well that they were working together, and would be working together for a long time. There was also the fact that he was still very much attracted to him, but that was a bridge he would cross when he would come across it.

That was something he probably needed to think about some more, but for another time.

...

Gabriel couldn’t stop smiling, honestly as he quietly closed the door, after chuckling to himself watching Jack turn crimson again when he thanked him for a fantastic night and bid him goodbye. He was a substantially better lay than he had previously thought, and he legitimately didn’t mind sleeping with him again. On top of all that he actually was great company to be with, and maybe the next date Gabriel thought they should just sit together and hang out, talk about stuff that wasn’t this mission. Honestly he couldn’t stop mentally thanking Ana for allowing them to work together. He never thought he would enjoy working in a collaboration. Perhaps he should pass by Ana’s office and personally thank her. Before that, however, he needed to go back to his own quarters and check his own datapad, see if there was anything he had missed or any messages he needed to get to.

There seemed to be nothing important right now, so Gabriel absent-mindedly started scrolling back up, to get back to the very top. He bit his lip when he thought how great Jack was last night, but then another thought that kept tugging at his mind that he couldn’t ignore for much longer kept plaguing him: what now?

Gabriel sighed, putting his datapad on the desk in front of him. He rarely indulged in anything remotely seexual with colleagues, yet here he was freely, initiating something that was definitely looking to be long term with a colleague he was currently working on in one of the more difficult cases of his career. He had absolutely no intention of leaving him hanging, because that would be an utter dick move.

He was almost having a headache. He’d think about all this later.

…

Turns out ‘later’ really wasn’t anytime in the near future.

It was barely even two hours since Gabriel woke up - though to be fair he woke up at about eleven in the morning - when he was called to Petras’ office.  _ Again.  _ When he got there, irritated he found an equally miffed Ana and a resigned Jack. Ana’s mood immediately went from miffed to slightly amused when she saw them and Jack’s ketchup-looking ass wasn’t helping matters in the least. Gabriel ran his hand over his face, asking whichever deities that were listening why now, and why the couldn’t keep his agony on hold until they were done dealing with this heathen that had called them.

“So you  _ did  _ sleep together?” she asked, sounding (and grinning, damn her) like the Cheshire Cat. Jack could not look either of them in the eye and Gabriel suddenly found his fingernails to be exceptionally fascinating. Goddamn her perception.

“I was bored, I wanted dick, he’s attractive  _ and  _ engaging  _ and  _ one of my types. Let me live,” Gabriel mumbled, shooting her a slight glare, but still managing to smile slightly. Jack, on the other hand, was still rediscovering the wonders of speech.

Ana raised her hands in the universal sign of surrender. “All I’m saying is that it’s about time. Was he as good as you dreamed of, Jackie?”

“Better,” he responded quietly, struggling to contain his blush.

Ana glanced at Gabriel, still addressing Jack. “I hear he’s really loud when he’s enjoying himself. You must have really hit some amazing spots. I’m proud of you, Jack. Satisfying Gabriel in any way, shape or form is a difficult feat.”

“Ana please stop,” Jack said, face buried in his hands as Ana cackled maniacally. Gabriel was silent, also slightly embarrassed because she wasn’t wrong.

Suddenly, their conversation was interrupted by Petras’ secretary, who looked even more stressed than the last time they saw her. “The Director will see you now,” she told them, after clearing her voice. They all nodded, terse, at her, before making their way into his office.

For a moment, all the three of them could do was stare. They were expecting to walk into a disaster, but instead they had walked into a catastrophe. Petras’ office looked and smelt like a nuclear disaster.  _ He himself  _ looked and smelt like a nuclear disaster. His shirt, once white was filthy with stains of coffee, food and sweat. His collar, where the material met with skin had gone from white, to black, to a disgusting green. His lips were cracked and had probably bled at some point going by the scabs on them. There were boxes of take out all over the office, from pizza to chips and chicken places to dodgy Asian food. His eyes were glazed over and swollen, a little red, probably from crying on and off. There were cigarette butts and ashes all over his desk and the carpet. Soft drink bottle and soft drink stains were on and around the table, a variety of spills and food crumbs also on the table and on the paperwork. He had ink stains on his hands and on his clothes. He looked like he hadn’t showered in a week and he looked exhausted, resigned. He looked like the world was coming to an end and he had given up hope. This was a man who was in the deepest of shits and he knew that whoever who had angered was substantially more powerful than him and they were going to destroy him, and he had resigned himself to his fate.

At first, Gabriel, Ana and Jack just awkwardly stood in his office, not knowing where to sit, because there was nowhere for them to sit. Petras looked up at them, weary, fingers stained from having smoked far too many cigarettes in a short time span.

“Amari. Reyes. Morrison.” His voice was croaky, small. He even sounded like he had given up on life. He wheezed as he turned around to face them, putting out his cigarette on a paper on his desk, before he realised what he was doing and winced. He coughed, his chest heavy and giving off a sickly sound, like phlegm had taken place of blood in his lungs, before calling his secretary, saying something in Italian. He waved his once meaty hand at them to sit, but they stayed standing because there was really nowhere for them to sit.

“Thank you, but I think we would prefer to stand,” Ana said, refraining from wincing and hoping she sounded diplomatic enough.

Petras wheezed again. “I have a feeling the three of you have an idea of how ibn La’Asid and Karim died. I have connections that are telling me Reyes and Morrison were the last ones to be seen with them. The Kingdom of Qatar and by extension the United Arab Emirates are suffering immensely as a result and I want the three of you to tell me what is going on.”

It was silent for a moment and all three of them had to summon every ounce of self control they possessed not to actually laugh out loud. “With all due respect but I really don’t understand where you got this idea from, that we were in any way, shape or form associated with the murders of Ms Karin and Mr ibn La’Asid,” ANa responded calmly.

“You were the last ones - “ he paused here to cough.” -  To be seen with them,” he said, trying to raise his voice but his current state not allowing him to.

“Indeed we were, but all we did was eat lunch with them, a lunch that, had your connections properly investigated, they will find they invited us for,” Gabriel added.

“An invite that we got at the end of our working hours the previous day, so really, there would have been no way just the two of us would plan to murder him in such a short time frame considering the kind of security they both have and the kind of security the restaurant he invited us to have.” Jack tried not to be too sarcastic, but he supposed some of it had leaked out.

“Then what were you doing in Qatar?” His voice cracked when he asked that question, having being overwhelmed with some kind of emotion. Grief? Fear? Regret? Who knew? Ana, Gabriel and Jack for sure didn’t.

“We were just doing our jobs, sir.” Gabriel was getting really tired really fast.

“Really? And why am I not privy to these jobs you are both allegedly doing?” He was really trying to push his limits it seemed. Jack was about to open  his mouth and really lay on the snark but it seemed Ana had beaten him to it.

“Overwatch is at risk of being destroyed by forces so powerful that even the United Nations might not be enough to save it. It’s our job, as Blackwatch to investigate these risks and try and eliminate them, and if not, reduce their liability to us as much as possible to ensure our survivability. This is why we were set up, this is what we do for you on a daily basis, Director, so that you can do your job, and everyone else in the organisation can do their job with peace of mind. I’m sure we talked about this mission before, and I’m also very sure I made it  _ extremely  _ clear to you that this mission is very dangerous and very classified and the only people aware of it are the people involved with it, which is the three of us. With all due respect I do not, at all, appreciate the tone you’re taking with me or my agents when we are constantly busting our asses making sure that we are going to survive.”

There was something in her tone that made Petras just look at her, the strength to argue gone, though at this point he barely even had the strength to live. He stared at them, his beady eyes sunken in and more glassy, before he looked back out his window, struggling to light a cigarette. Ana turned around and left, having recognised that this conversation was over, and she was followed closely behind by Gabriel and Jack.

It was time for a change of plans.

…

“He’s either in absolute shit, is on to us, or both,” Jack said, as he took a seat in Ana’s office in front of her massive desk.

“Both. Most definitely both,” Gabriel agreed, taking a seat on the other seat, also in front of Ana’s desk.

“Indeed, but he doesn’t have proof. And you’ve just seen the man. He’s in shit and he knows it. Of course any normal person can think he’s mourning a dear ally, colleague and his subordinate, but we know better. Talon has lost one of their most powerful members, if not their most powerful members and Overwatch is suspected to be behind it. However, nobody can prove it. If this was supposed to be a hush mission - which is it because, after all, it  _ was  _ an assassination - then only Blackwatch can do it, but Director Ana Amari, head of Blackwatch has absolutely no idea about it and she’s sent Gabriel Reyes and Jack Morrison, two of her best agents to investigate something else that is endangering Overwatch.” She took a sip of her tea, staring straight at Jack and Gabriel. 

“Talon might be weary of Overwatch, and Blackwatch in particular, but they aren’t stupid. They  _ need  _ us, and Petras knows this, Talon is aware Petras knows this. It’s why they manipulated the UN to make him head. They are trying to control us via Petras, but they can’t. All of us, including me know our records off head. There’s almost absolutely nothing on paper, or on record anywhere about us. I’m the only publicly known Blackwatch operative alive, and even then, no one is entirely sure if I’m still on active duty, not even Petras. We’re so ambiguous, it scares them. Very ironical.”

“How long you think till they get rid of him?” Gabriel asked. Jack shrugged.

“A couple of months. Of course it’s not difficult for them, but they need to make it look like an accident, so they’re probably planning for it now. Not to mention the Arabs are gonna start giving them a headache in a bit, particularly Qatar, which has the biggest natural gas reserves. OPEC can’t piss them off,” he said.

“Right on the mark, Jack. But now - “

Ana was rudely interrupted by a call from Sombra, and for once she was dead serious, that trademark playfulness disappeared from her voice. Gabriel narrowed his eyes. This wasn’t good.

“McAfee is gone. I’m trying to track her, but I’m just giving you a heads up. You gotta move now.” And just like that, she had disconnected herself.

Well, fuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been the longest time ever. A lot has been going on. I'm sorry. Updates will be a lot more frequent this time. I promise.
> 
> The plot is thickening now. For real for real.


	10. Onto the next one

Just when they thought things couldn’t get any worse.

For a moment after Sombra appeared and disappeared, all three of them just sat there, staring at the massive, blank screen in front of them, trying to process what it was they had just heard.

Madeleine McAfee had disappeared.

Realistically, it’s not like they weren’t expecting it, it’s just that they weren’t expecting it to happen so soon. They, including her, were all aware of the risk of something leaking out and someone having to take one for the team, and McAfee and Blackwatch had signed a contract that if something happened to her as a result of her assistance to them, they would do everything in their power to ensure she got back alive and in one piece.

And now, it was time for that to happen.

They were still trying to get their thoughts in order, when Sombra called again. They all eyed each other, apprehension thick in the air before Ana answered, swallowing, not knowing what to expect. “Hello?”

“Big Boss Lady. Thank God. I do apologise for scaring you all like that the last time. I’m glad you’re fine. I have much better news for you this time,” she started, still serious but very relieved. She was very expressive in her voice, which is why she probably always had that mischievous playfulness as her default state. She knew people who were perceptive enough could be able to gauge what she was feeling from her tone, so why not have a tone that was never serious. SHe then noticed that Gabriel and Jack were were in the room, and extended her greetings to them.

Ana nodded to her once, terse. “Go on.”

“I found her, and I also found the people who are after her. If you want I can connect you to her and then give you the details.” Ana nodded, and within moments Madeleine appeared on the screen before them, and she looked like a fucking a mess.

That was an understatement. She looked absolutely horrible, like she was on the run. Gabriel and Jack truly felt sorry for her. Her red hair, normally  sleek and healthy with a sheen was tied back in a high ponytail, more dull than usual, her eyes however never changed, still sharp and observant, though she had noticeable bags, and they were slightly bloodshot, obviously from very little sleep, but it also be from something else. She had on a blue t shirt, and she looked absolutely exhausted, almost haggard.

“Evening, lads.” Her voice was hoarse, strained, as she greeted them with a mock salute. Her accent, they also realised was a lot more pronounced, probably as a result of the stress. “I take it you’re all doing far better than I am.”

Jack leaned forward to respond, seemingly the first out of the three of them to recover and rediscover the wonders of speech. “Pray tell, what in the fuck is going on, exactly, McAfee?”

Madeleine took a swig of a brown liquid that looked suspiciously like scotch. “I’ll take that as a yes. A lot is going on, Jack. Far more than I can handle. D’you mind if I call you Jack?”

All three of them stared at her, facial expressions hard. She sighed, her shoulders slumping. 

“Someone was onto us. I still don’t know who, but there was someone who had an idea of what I had been doing in Doha, what I had been setting up for. I highly doubt they are aware of my connection to you, or that if they know I even have any association with you, but that’s irrelevant because I’m the one that’s in shit. I should have been more careful. I never thought I’d live to see the day where my carelessness would cost me far more than I can ever pay back, but here we are. God I’m such a fucking idiot.”

Gabriel was about to open his mouth and demand for a backstory, but the defeated tone she ended with tugged at something in him that made him shut his mouth right back up. SHe hadn’t quite reached Petras’ level yet, but she was pretty low, and snapping at her really wasn’t going to help anyone in this situation, least of all them.

“We would appreciate it if you gave us some back story there, Madeleine. We can’t help you if we don’t really have anything to work with.” He didn’t mean his voice to be that gentle.

Madeleine perked up at that. “You wanna help me?”

Ana shrugged. “You were very instrumental in us getting rid of La’Asad and Karim, and we have a feeling whoever is onto you is either in Talon or contracted to them, so we’ll just kill two birds with one stone. It’s the least we could do for you.”

She dropped her head, sniffling for a moment before hastily wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. Her cheeks were slightly damp when she looked back up, and her eyes redder, more puffed up. But when she spoke her voice was clear and steady.

“I was born and brought up in upper middle class Glasgow, with an economist father and an accountant mother. I have three brothers, all of whom are engineers. I’m the odd one one who followed my parents in banking, specifically finance. Life was alright and we were doing good until one day my mother found out a whole lot of accountant discrepancies in the company she was working for. She brought that up with her boss who brought it up with the big guys in London. He and my mum were both immediately told to shut up and never mention it, but my mum could not do. She couldn’t work in a company that was lying in their books to, at the time, protect Talon, so she quit.”

She took another swig of her scotch, and this time when she breathed out her breath was slightly shaky. The three of them were pretty sure it wasn’t because of the scotch.

“She could barely be hired in Scotland, despite her qualifications, so she started looking for jobs in the Eurozone, somewhere where she wouldn’t be too penalised for not being a citizen. She never lasted, maybe four or five months. That’s just how connected the financial world is, and by then, Talon was already in control of most of the financial world. Even abroad in different countries, different  _ continents  _ no one would hire her, and they never gave her a solid reason why. Then one day when she flew out to Germany, Frankfurt, if I recall correctly, she never got back. No call, no text, no email, no nothing. She just disappeared. It was very uncharacteristic of her, not communicating with us. My dad tried searching, calling on his connections and all his expertise to try and find her, but instead, our worst nightmare, collectively begun.”

Her pauses were always to recollect herself. This was obviously not something she was sued to saying, and it seemed like it really hurt her, and for a moment Gabriel felt incredibly guilty for making her relive this.

“I’m sorry Madeleine. You really don’t have to go on if it’s too hard for you,”Jack said, his voice incredibly soothing. Madeleine looked up at them, shaking her head frantically. 

“No. This is important. For all of us.” She swallowed again. “Turns out she was abducted, because she was one of the very few people who could piece together and have an idea of what was going on. Of course she didn’t know about Talon, but she  _ was  _ aware that there was something going on that didn’t just involve her boss’ boss that might be the reason why she wasn’t being employed, and why they didn’t really want her to come clean with all the discrepancies they demanded she hides. They decided to teach us a lesson they wouldn’t even bother with asking for ransom or anything, just send us her body and her head, severed at the neck in a body bag. My dad went into a depression for months, and for a long time we are the ones that had to take care of all of us and him. He quit his job and descended into alcoholism, because for some reason he thought he could save her and he failed.”

She was quiet again, taking another swig of scotch, before screwing the lid shut and putting the bottle next to her.

“My brothers and I took it upon ourselves to thoroughly investigate what happened, and we came across Talon. Obviously they were too powerful for us, so I volunteered to go to Doha and find out as much as I could about them, and at least try and do something to sabotage them from within, try and see if I could get people who would side with me to attempt to cripple them, to do  _ something  _ to prevent them from making another family go through what they made my family go through. I was honestly giving up, until Ana contacted me.”

She chuckled here, the sound more sardonic than anything else.

“I’m still not quite sure of how she knew about me or how she contacted me or even how she knew what I was primarily here to do, but I guess it’s the nature of the job, huh? She was extremely convincing, and though I was kind of skeptical about her at first, something told me that it would be worth trusting her, and now here I am, a fugitive, running from the very people that murdered my mum. I have to survive. I can’t have my family go through that trauma again.”

It was silent for a moment, as all of them internalised just what they had heard. It was then that Gabriel remembered what she told them why she was helping the first time they met, that she was doing this for mostly selfish reasons, that there was some revenge going on.

“Are you staying with anyone right now?” Jack asked. She snorted. 

“In a motel. I’m on the run, remember? I don’t want to endanger anyone else.”

Ana glanced towards Sombra, who smirked. “In that case, I got you covered, friends. I have a friend in China, Xin Cheng. I can ask him to help out.”

Ana nodded. “Alright. Gabriel and Jack can wait for a bit while I get these details about these guys. Madeleine, take care of yourself. I’m sending my agents to Shanghai to collect you and sort out the Talon mess that’s at the Shanghai stock exchange. I’ll arrange another phone call when I’m sure about this contact of Sombra’s.”

…

It was a grand total of three days before Gabriel and Jack found themselves on a flight on their way to Shanghai. Things had happened so fast that all they could do was reminisce about it all. How was this real life?

It didn’t take long for Ana to meet up with Sombra’s contract, a not-so-young individual by the name of Xin Cheng. They worked for the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and was one of China’s most brilliant and infamous hackers, which is the reason they was hired by their government. That fact, hilariously ironic as it was, was not lost on Ana, Gabriel or Jack. It was very obvious that the government did not one hundred percent trust them, and they were aware of this, but the government was also very aware that if you gave them one hour and a reason they would systematically shut down the government  _ themselves,  _ so they never tried them.

They were very lucky that they were as loyal as they were to their people, and the only thing that they hated more than imperialism was any form of discrimination.

Understandable, considering they identified as genderfluid and bisexual.

They were in front of them on the screen, Jet black hair, rosy cheeks and sucking on a lollipop. They were dressed in masculine formal wear, a dress shirt, loosened at the top, a tie, also loosened and dress pants. They looked from Ana to Jack to Gabriel, before they laughed, genuinely laughed. The trio just stared back.

“Ah, I’m sorry about that. Sombra told me that you guys were all badasses and that I should be careful, but you guys looks really normal. Absurdly normal. She also told me that Madeleine trusts you, and since she’s in my care, I’ll trust you too. But if you fuck her up, I’ll shut down your super badass secret spy agency thing within an hour.”

The three of them knew, that they was not joking and that they could. They had seen their qualification and their work. They were in Sombra’s league when it came to sheer brilliance and aptitude, and they had a feeling they was a connection that would be most valuable in the oncoming battle.

“Hello Xin. I’m not going to waste your time to introduce yourself because I’m sure you already know what you need to know about me, so I’ll just get straight to the point. What do you know about Talon and why are you risking your person to protect Ms McAfee?”

They calmly stopped chewing their gum, removing it from their mouth and putting it in its wrapper, before tossing in presumably a bin somewhere behind them.

“Because I hate Talon. They are holding my government hostage as they try and take control of Shanghai. They know China is the next big destination, as shown by our economic status the past couple of years, and I’m not gonna sit back and watch some greedy old white, racist assholes overwork and exploit my people to the ground because they want more material wealth when they already have more than they need.”

Well, that settled things then.

Ana was about to open her mouth to respond, to tell them that they had a deal with Blackwatch, but they beat her to it.

“Why the fuck is there absolutely  _ nothing  _ about the three of you online though?”

Ana smirked. “Don’t worry, Xin. You’ll get to know about us in good time. As you said, you trust Sombra, and she trusts us. We both know what we want from this arrangement, and so far Sombra and us have not no conflict or reason to sabotage each other. I’m sending Gabriel and Jack to China immediately. I’m also adding you to our private channel where we’ll exchange information there. Help us help you take Talon down. I promise you you won’t regret it.”

Xin leaned back in their chair, looking right at Ana. “I saw what shenanigans you were up to in Doha. I know you won’t me down. I’m just worried for Madeleine.”

Ana shrugged. “Fair enough. You’ll work on specifics when my men arrive, no?”

They nodded, before everyone bid each other goodbye.

Barely six hours later Gabriela and Jack were being bundled in a cab, on their way to the airport. Gabriel in particular felt that SHanghai was going to be far more difficult that Doha was, particularly because Talon would most definitely be on the lookout, and it was going to be doubly complicated because they never knew where they were last attacked from. Then there was the issue of Petras, whether or not he was going to be alive by the time they would be leaving China.

Oh boy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so some stuff. This is the first time I'm writing a genderfluid individual. I based them off one of my fave anime characters and I also believe in representation and alladat. I strongly encourage constructive criticism here because this is my first time doing this and as much as I'll try to ensure that there's no stereotypes I'm aware that I'm prone to fuck ups and I should be called out when I get out of line.
> 
> Other than that, come bother me on [tumblr](http://nutheadgee.tumblr.com/) goddamn it.


	11. We are all human

Gabriel and Jack were not amused.

“Are we ever gonna rest in this bloody city?” Gabriel grumbled, firmly in his bed, still covered until just under his arms in his duvet, and glaring under his sleeping cap. Sombra, who thought that was the most adorable he looked, couldn’t stop cackling every once in a while. Jack was seated next to him on the bed, cross legged and his chin plopped on his palm, looking sleepy and miserable, saying that if he got in the covers he’d fall asleep and never get up.

“This really better be urgent. It’s three in the fucking morning and we arrived like 4 hours ago and we just wanna fucking sleep,” he growled, scratching his eyes. Why the fuck was Sombra  _ still  _ snickering?!

“There’s just some info I wanted to relay to you from Xin. They’ll let you rest for the next two days, but after that they’ll meet you at your hotel lobby and tell you all about Shanghai and the stock exchange, then they’ll take you to where Madeleine is. After that they’ll tell you about the suspects that we have, we are very sure work for Talon. Not quite as influential as La’Asid, but high enough that getting rid of them is going to cause another shock. Then from there will be the next course of action, which is basically how you guys will go in and end them,” she said, waving them goodbye with a mock salute and switching off the transmission. Jack got out and dragged himself back his room. It was time for them to black the fuck out because it was about to be a long ride.

…

Two days later found the three individuals in the lobby of the hotel. Xin seemed visibly impressed at where they were, going by their low whistle when they looked around the place. “I can see Blackwatch is using state money very, very well. “

Jack was a little more polite, but Gabriel rolled his eyes, prompting Xin to smirk. They had heard that a million times and it was getting real old. “All right, buddy. Tell us what we need to know about this place.”

Xin suddenly got serious, leaning forward with their large tablet, very similar to the one that Madeleine had all those months ago in Doha. “Shanghai is not quite like Doha, in that as much as it’s a huge stock exchange and there’s a lot of trading, it’s still not open to foreign companies and countries due to the capital controls put in place by the government. This is partly Talon’s doing, but most of it is due to the government. As a result you  _ will  _ find some resistance when you work, but luckily for you I was able to forge some letters to put some levels of fear with the people you will be working with.”

They removed the letters and handed them to to Gabriel and Jack. For the most part they looked exactly the same, with some differences to account for their names, positions and duties. They then sent copies to Ana, and uploaded other copies, in all the United Nations mandated languages to their separate server.

“I’m giving you the English copy, but I have the Mandarin copy, along with all other United Nations mandated languages, which I’ll plant into out Ministry of Finance, our Central Bank and the UN. Now, let me explain to you your roles as far as these letters are concerned, and your actual roles here.”

They leaned forward, pulling up a dummy article and pointing to it, as Gabriel and Jack nodded and hummed appropriately, getting in on the act.

“These letters say that the two of you are here from the World Bank to audit the People’s Bank of China on their monetary policy and and regulation of financial institutions of mainland China. You will be provided with translators, my brother being one of them and helping me in the fight against Talon. He’s one of the most senior legal officers, so he should be able to give you most of the documents you need without raising too much alarm. He’s also one of the best lawyers I know in this country,  and as long as you follow his instructions you should be able to get everything you need to slaughter the assholes that are trying to enslave my country. The ‘audit’ will take four months - a third of the year - and, as Ana informed you before you left - that will be the time frame you’ll have to complete this mission. If not, then we’ll have to initiate the much riskier plan B, which, I’m also told you’re aware of. When you are done with this bullshit then you must leave immediately. I and my crew will deal with this mess.”

Sounded straight forward enough. What about Madeleine though?

“The people after her will lead you straight to New York and London, and you’ll be travelling back and forth, if I’m not mistaken. I think Jake is working on that info for the network, but I’ll talk to Sombra. They definitely hired the Triad to assassinate her over here, but they are really half assing it because it’s just hit them that they are pawns in the grand scheme of things, and they don’t like being played like that, so they are gonna be deliberately clumsy about it. I can’t give you exact names because they are involved in government, and in particular finance, and I’m already on thin ice with them, but my brother assured me he can extract enough information to properly guide you on the guys who ordered the hit. They are for sure Chinese, because the Triad don’t easily make deals with non nationals, and if the Triad took this deal, it means the roach or roaches are most definitely a member of Talon.”

Gabriel and Jack took their letters, putting them in envelopes and patiently waiting for Xin to finish shutting down all their devices and packing up. “You begin work the day after tomorrow. My brother is already aware of the plan.”

This was going to be a lot.

…

This mission had been riddled with understatements the whole time, which, in turn, made it very dramatic.

Gabriel and Jack, however, had no issue with dramatics. It came with the job after all, and the two of them were well aware of how dramatic they were as individuals, but this, this was a whole other different story.

Xin’s brother, a gentleman by the name  of An had turned up punctually in the lobby of their hotel, speaking in despicable English. He introduced the other translator, and the first thing he asked was if they had received the email he sent them the previous night. The email had English code words that they would use when they would want more information without anyone else knowing, and it clearly showed An’s mastery in the English language, when he could take advantage of its abstract grammar rules. Gabriel and Jack knew they were going to be very impressed with this guy, and honestly upon meeting him they were truly charmed.

“Today you’re going to be meeting with our minister of Finance, who is generally very well respected in the international community, but his reputation at home is extremely mixed, split straight in the middle. He’s either very adored or utterly despised, no middle ground at all: a very rare and interesting thing here in China,” An noted, and Gabriel and Jack got the hint. This finance dude was a Talon man, through and through. They never even had to ask why, because his terse, almost imperceptible nod told them that he would give them more information on the same when they got into the office.

“Together we’re going to host you and talk about finance in the country and go through some World Bank promises and agreements between our great country and the United Nations, then he’ll probably show off some of our statistics - which are very good, even I’ll admit that - and maybe you will meet some heads of our more popular banks, then this we will fly to Beijing and you will meet the governor of the People’s Bank of China evening and begin your work.”

That was another very loaded statement, but for the most part the implications were quite clear. There was a likelihood the bank heads they would meet would be Talon minions, or at the very least sympathisers, but they were not sure if the governor of the Central Bank was part of them or not. They would find out soon enough, though.

…

The Minister of Finance was everything that Gabriel and Jack were expecting: someone who had just walked out of the University of Oxford Business School with an MBA and was top of his class. He was very formal and very business like, immediately getting straight to the point after greetings and some small talk about China. The man had done his research about the World Bank, and he had come prepared. He had with him on hand all the necessary statistics about where the economy of China was, where they had intentions to improve, where the most money was being allocated and why, regional trade, monetary policies (macro and micro) and how they were affecting economic growth, new trade partners...everything you would possibly need to tell an international auditor about the current state of your country.

In fact, Gabriel noted, he was overloading them with information, giving them so much in such a short time frame, as if he had every intention to overwhelm them so that they’d be too busy looking at paperwork to really be doing anything else of substance. He would be sure to bring this up with An.

As predicted,  he introduced them to the CEOs of some of the larger and more commercially successful banks, and after some more small (including talks of how Gabriel in particular found his time there and if he had yet been to the villages and met the older generation who had never seen a black person before), they were given a whole lot more paperwork and Gabriel and Jack promised to start the audits as soon as possible after they went through all the documentation.

“What do you think?” A asked, when they were finally in his office. The office was not bugged, and Gabriel and Jack had made sure that nobody near the place understood a single word of English.

“He was trying to overload us with information so that there would be a possibility that we would not finish this audit on time. There’s a high possibility he’s trying to hide something, or stall something. Perhaps both,” Jack noted, leaning back in his chair.

“There was also his behaviour. He was very vague in his interactions, and kept directing us to  other people when we requested for specific information. This man is not an idiot, he's incredibly smart, and his reputation precedes him. Part of his unpopularity is the discipline he brought into the financial sector in this country,  and the gains had only started being apparent in the near past. It would be extremely unprofessional of him to not know the answers to the questions we were asking, which goes back to Jack’s point that there’s something he for sure does not want us to know.”

An nodded. “Yes. Both of you are very right. He was inducted into Talon relatively recently, but for some reason he still has this firm belief that Talon will eventually help China. It’s a very strange form of internalised hatred, and it’s generally very difficult to change his mind, so getting him to see that Talon is going to destroy the whole world because of how individualistic their greed is is almost impossible at this point. There is also the point that he grew up extremely poor, and was in poverty well into his mid twenties, so when he lucked out and got a government job and climbed the ranks, he has still never gotten over how much of a difference material wealth can make in your life. It’s one thing when you’re being told how money can improve your life, and it’s quite another to literally see it in action in your life.”

Gabriel and Jack nodded. That would explain how Talon could so easily reel him in and keep him there. All they had to do was promise him more money for himself and his family, as long as he could guarantee a portion of China’s wealth into the Talon machine. They knew of his tenacity and his doggedness, and they knew that with him on their side very little would get in their way.

“I’ll have Xin get you his entire life story. Perhaps there will be something in there that could be relevant to you. What would you like from me?”

Gabriel and Jack paused. “Statistics on the shares being most traded the past six months and predictions for the future. Who is trading them the most and the amounts being traded at all times,” Jack said slowly, his mind still going through the probable information they might need.

“We also need any and all business transactions he has been doing - both public and private - for the past six months: buying and selling of assets, buying and selling of shares and the movement of money in the country and in the region. We also want to know if there has been any communication with Talon, where they are normally based when they come to China and the frequency with which they have been travelling here,” Gabriel added, knowing that they were asking a lot and going by An’s face, wondering if they could be able to get that information. He was well aware that it was a lot to ask for, but the nature of this job always meant pushing your boundaries a little bit. Risk was always inherent to this line of work. He was sure their allies were informed of this.

An nodded, drumming his fingers against his table as he thought of how he was going to deliver what they needed. He looked up at them after a couple of seconds. “Your information,” he said, pointing at Jack. “Will not be particularly hard to get. I have some people who work in my department who can give it to me for analysis, so I can give you either a broad overview of give you exact statistics of what you want. I will have it ready in three days. I will have Xin set up a secret network between the three of us where we will be sharing this information.”

He turned to Gabriel, leaning slightly forward. “Your information, however is going to be slightly more difficult to obtain, and is going to take me a little longer. There are fiduciary duties involved, due to the kind of information needed and the seniority of the people involved. It should take me anywhere between a week to a week and a half to get you proper and comprehensive information. I can assure you that the time will be made up for by the shorter time frame you will use when consolidating your investigations. I hope this is appropriate.”

Gabriel leaned back in his chair, nodding slowly. “Of course. No problem at all. I only ask for one thing: please be careful. DO not put your person, your life, your career or your people at risk just to get this information. If something is difficult to find just inform me and I will find a way around it. My boss is not going to accept any casualties in this mission, either in the short or long term, and I firmly agree with her. You are already taking a very big risk doing this - bigger even than other allies in other countries due to the nature of your government - and thought they are a little apprehensive of your sibling, the Chinese government is still not one that should be pushed.”

An just stared at Gabriel for some seconds, blinking in what was most definitely confusion, before finding himself scrambling up when Gabriel and Jack did. It was as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He bid them goodbye, and during the handshake, he bowed deeply at them, thanking them quietly, but with such conviction that Gabriel and Jack couldn’t help but smile. They bowed back, before leaving.

“You’re a good person, Gabe,” Jack said quietly to him as they sat in the car on their way to the hotel.

Gabriel reached for his hand and squeezed it. “It keeps me sane, to remind others that they are humans, and not cogs to run the capitalist machine.”

Jack squeezed his hand back. They were about to fuck shit up for some nasty people, and he couldn’t wait to start.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is for all the people that feel they are nothing but a part that makes others but not themselves.
> 
> You're still human and you're still valued. Never forget that.


	12. First Confession

They had just gotten back into their room when they got a call from Sombra. Only, it wasn’t just Sombra in the call.

“To answer your question, Gabe, no, we’re never gonna get any rest in this city,” Jack mumbled, shaking his head now in his hands. The good thing was that Madeleine seemed to have far more colour in her face now, the bags under her eyes weren’t as heavy, her hair was beginning to receive its sheen back and she was digging far too enthusiastically into that sandwich.

“Good evening gentlemen,” Xin said, their voice a near cackle. They were definitely up to no good. Gabe and Jack just nodded at them.

“She in Shanghai now?” Gabriel asked and watched Madeleine nod with so much exuberance. “What’s up?”

“I’m sending someone to pick you up at your hotel. He’s a black South African, and he already knows what you look like. He’ll bring you to where Sombra, Madeleine and I are, then we are going to get in touch with Ana. There’s something we’ve found out and we think it will be important for you to know.”

Gabriel and Jack sighed.

…

It took them about twenty minutes to get to this alleged hideout where the other three were. It was a decently luxurious apartment in one of the nicer suburbs of Shanghai according to the chauffeur, not exactly high end Chinese real estate, but upper middle class young professionals are the ones that lived here - especially civil servants - and since generally the Chinese citizens were very loyal to their government, nobody would ever question what people did in their residences around this area, which, for people like Xin, made it very easy for them to do the kind of work they were doing now.

“Nice place,” Gabriel said, looking around at the lighting and the interior design of the place. Xin acknowledged him with their thanks, before calling on Madeleine and Sombra to come out.

Madeleine had lost a whole lot of weight since they last saw her. The thought that she actually looked  _ worse… _

Sombra on the other hand looked a lot like what Gabriel and Jack expected. She was also really short, something Jack almost opened his mouth to say, but he knew the roasting that would come his way, so he chose to keep his mouth shut.

Xin offered them all a seat, before removing their tablet and laying it on the table for them, pulling up information on the Triad and Talon. Ah, this was going to be interesting.

“The Triad has a seat in Talon, at the very top, which explains why they were more than willing to trawl the world looking for Madeleine over here. The, catch, however, is that the guy that’s forced to deal with the rest of them hates it. He absolutely  _ despises _ the entire concept of Talon, because when they succeed the Triad and any other organised crime group, for that matter, will become obsolete. There is nothing most of them can do except organised crime. They were born and brought up in that kind of system and the thought of being made useless in society is not something they take to kindly, considering how proud they are as individuals and as a group. So he wants out, but he can’t get out because Talon suspects - rightfully so - that they may organise all other organised crime groups in the world to get rid of them.”

Gabriel looked between the three individuals in front of him and the tablet. “Go on.”

“Now, on the East Asian branches of Talon, there’s a conflict, and that conflict is pouring into the rest of Talon because as you know China is the second biggest economy in the world and they have given a lot of financial support to the United States. Talon as a whole can’t afford to deal with this conflict right now, but they are still reeling from the mayhem you caused in Doha, so Mr. Triad is proving to be, how do you say it in English, a thorn in the flesh?”

“Thorn on the side,” Madeleine and Jack corrected in unison.

“Yes, that.”

Jack looked at Xin, his eyebrow raised as the skepticism could be felt from him in waves. “Please don’t tell me you want us to meet this guy.” He couldn’t hide the incredulity in his voice no matter how hard he tried.

Sombra perked up, grinning like the Cheshire cat. They were definitely up to no good.

“No, of course we don’t want you to meet this guy. That’s some amatuer shit. What’s gonna happen is I’m gonna leave the country and get in touch with him and offer his a proposition, tell him that if he provides the names of the people in Talon that are giving him a hard time, we get rid of them for him, and he’s gonna be scot free. In exchange, of course, he’s gonna have to provide some man power during their assassination. We’ve gotten rid of one big guy of Talon, so now we got five more to go.”

Gabriel looked at her. “We don’t even have to get rid of of all of them, even half of them will cause a massive blow to their plans. Weakening them and then completely destroying them later on doesn’t seem like too bad of an idea.”

Everyone seemed to agree with that, before Jack brought up a slight problem. “We need distractions. Someone needs to keep the finance minister busy, find a way to cause this distraction to ripple into Talon as well, as Sombra deals with the Triad and Xin and An continue to channel information to us.”

Gabriel smirked a little viciously. It kind of unnerved everyone. “I gotchu on that.” 

Oh boy.

…

With the way Gabriel and Jack were set up, a couple of days later, in Gabriel’s room, you could have thought they were getting ready to watch a movie. Gabriel had even made caramel popcorn, Jack had baked the cookies and they had both got an unholy amount of soda, ready to watch Petras’ press conference, his first since the deaths of Karim and ibn La’Asid.

Ana had gotten in touch with them, cackling with amusement. Even after the teleconference cal had connected she still giggled for about ten minutes before telling them that Petras was going to be doing a press conference, to update the world of the investigations with the two high profile deaths. They remembered the first conference when he looked like he was setting up for a date with death, the media team had literally exhausted their make up trying to make him look somewhat presentable, and they only just managed to make him look like he was dying of stress, and that these assassinations had really gotten to him, having lost his “dear wife” and a “dear friend.”

Ana, Gabriel and Jack couldn’t stop rolling their eyes at the sheer pretense that was going on, but none of them was in a place to comment, as they knew, well enough, the mark  of being a good diplomat was to pretend really well and lie straight through your teeth, and after all, they were part of the same thread that was Overwatch and by extension, the United Nations. Gabriel and Jack had more than once discussed the implications of Petras knowing that they as Blackwatch had orchestrated these two deaths, they knew he was in Talon and they were aiming to to destroy all of Talon and they decided it was a good thing that he had absolutely no idea.

Today he looked marginally better, though, of course, credit had to be given to the makeup team for the phenomenal effort they had put in to make him look more like a human being than anything else. His bags, thought weighing at least a kilo each seemed lighter, and they had somehow managed to completely remove the circles under his eyes. The wrinkles  on his face that had increased since the assassination had also been covered, and his clothes seemed cleaner and fresher. He even had a bottle of water on his podium, and his hands didn’t seemed to have the cigarette burn marks of the darkening from excessive smoking.

He looked like a normal, albeit stressed human being, not the disaster that they saw before flying over to Shanghai.

He was standing outside his offices, on his podium. There were so many microphones in front of him, from all major international media companies in all possible languages. There was also the UN and Overwatch ones, Gabriel noted with glee, and he couldn’t wait for the Blackwatch team to analyse every last pixel of his speech, to tell them about his body language, and about what he really thought in this whole mess as opposed to the drafted speech he was given.

He opened his mouth to begin talking and immediately the entire place fell silent. “Good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to come and show the world what we are doing for them as an organisation to keep them safe.”

Jack snorted. Honestly speaking, he too would love to be paid millions of dollars a year to blatantly lie to the world.

“As you are all aware, a few months ago, two very high profile assassinations took place, the assassinations of two very important people both to Overwatch and to me as an individual. The world was immediately in mourning. Ahmed ibn La’Asan and Zaina Karim were two extra ordinary individuals, who did a great deal to help their countries and contributed greatly to the international community as well. Their loss is something both the government of the Kingdom of Qatar and Overwatch are taking extremely seriously, and I would like to assure you that we are investigating every single lead we have. There is no doubt in my mind that we will get to the bottom of who was behind this, and we will bring them to justice.”

The cameras never stopped flashing even as he turned around and went back into the building, no doubt in his office to continue to think about just how fucked he was and how many more days he had before Talon came to end him. The reporter they were watching, the Chinese representative from the main media house there (CCTV) went on with her reporting, and Jack finally switched off the television.

“That was really anticlimactic,” he said, looking at Gabriel, who nodded in agreement. “It really doesn’t give us anything to work with, which means we wasted our time listening to him tell us garbage we already knew.

Gabriel chuckled quietly, running his hands a little further up Jack’s thigh than would be considered appropriate. Jack’s breath hitched in his throat, but he nevertheless did not react negatively to Gabriel’s touch. Gabriel ran his hand over Jack’s cheek, dropping it down to his chin and turning him to face him. Jack’s face immediately went red, his dick was hardening real quick in his shirts too. The look on his face: the lazy smirk, the full blown pupils and was that his hand snaking up into - 

Jack gasped out, muffling a curse when Gabriel grabbed his dick through his shorts, and before he could do anything else he felt a set of full lips against his own, and he felt as though his body was moving on its own, as he turned around and scrambled right onto his lap, kissing him back.

Gabriel felt that usual feeling of arousal pooling at the pit of his stomach. He was expecting just a little bit of resistance, not for Jack to melt in his hands this easily. He smiled, inwardly laughing as he used his thumb to pull his chin down, opening up his mouth to dip his tongue in. Jack moaned, clutching at his shirt harder, and he Gabriel slowly pushed him back onto the bed, and the moment Jack his the duvet he bit his tongue, trying to prevent whatever embarrassing sound from leaving when Gabriel’s mouth went from his mouth to his jaw, to his neck, making sure to leave a couple of marks as he pulled Jack’s shirt up, running his hands down his sleek abdomen and his shorts down, completely off his legs and threw them at the foot of their bed.

Gabriel sat up and stared at Jack, and in his opinion he was at his most beautiful  like this. His dick was hard, thick, slightly flushed, and he was leaking. He had gripped the duvet like a lifeline, his chest rising up and down, eyes closed, blushing, as he braced himself for whatever pleasure Gabriel was going to be giving him. Gabriel run his finger over the trail of hair from his naval onto his pubes, running it over the vein on his cock, and at this point Jack was gritting his teeth, trying desperately to contain himself.

Jack was sure Gabriel had every intent to kill him dead this evening. In retrospect he should have thought that this was his intention all along, when he ‘invited’ him to go and watch the speech in his room. They both knew exactly what Petras was going to say, so them watching him was irrelevant in the long run, but his dumb - and thirsty - ass went along anyway. He wasn’t really complaining though, because Gabriel had really been looking like a snack the past couple of days, especially that time he saw him walk out of the steam room, completely naked and completely confident in his nudity. Jack really thanked the Fates for the steam being that dense, because he couldn’t stop his hand immediately reaching for his cock and giving himself a few stokes. It was almost humiliating how fast he came, but then again, Gabriel Reyes was literally Adonis in the flesh.

He noticed that there was suddenly nothing going on, and it was quiet. He was rock hard, and he desperately needed relief. He cracked an eye open, saw Gabe bent over rummaging about in his bedside. He was just opening his mouth to begin complaining, when faster than his aroused mind could follow he felt that lage hand around his cock again, cold with lube, firm strokes, up and down. Jack couldn’t help it, particularly as he noticed how unpredictable it was, with varying speeds and pressure, and especially when his thumb slowly passed over his tip, the core in his abdomen tightening even more, he moaned, loudly and shamelessly. Where the  _ fuck  _ did Gabe learn how to give handjobs like this?!

Gabriel was actually smiling warmly as he looked down at Jack, watching his balls tense, the muscles in his thighs harden. His hips bucked up into his hand, and he noticed the slight sheen of sweat on his forehead, his shallow breaths, and just then, with one last muffled curse he came, chanting Gabriel’s name like a chant, spilling himself all over Gabriel’s hand, over his stomach and over his thighs. Gabriel slowed his hand, already developing a wrist cramp - more than worth it if you asked him. Very few things gave him joy than watching Jack sated - before finally stopping, watching Jack slowly open his eyes, smiling up at him.

“Th-thank you,” he whispered, looking down at himself, then back up at Gabriel. “Do I really have to go - “

“Go clean up, Morrison. You’ve already messed up my bed. Hurry up then we can go sleep. We’ve got chaos to sow tomorrow.”

“I’ll definitely get back at you for this.”

“You enjoyed it.”

“I did, which is why I’ll get back at you.”

Gabriel leaned down to give him a kiss, deep, but sweet. Jack may have giggled a little bit before kissing him back.

“Go shower Jackie. We really need to go sleep.”

Jack felt warm and fuzzy inside. “I love you, Gabe,” he said quietly, before getting up and walking to the shower on shaky legs. He never noticed Gabriel freeze in place, shocked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was it too feelsy towards the end? The handjob bit was a bit rushed because it was pretty impromptu, and I apologise for that, but there's gonna be some angst buildup from here on out to compensate.


	13. Risks

Gabriel was the first one to wake up and he found his nose and mouth buried in blonde hair. He smiled, feeling how he and Jack were tangled in each other’s arms and legs, Jack slowly breathing in and out as he slept. He rubbed his back slightly, feeling his lover fidget, as Jack relaxed and pulled him closer into him. He was so adorable.

He gently kissed the top of his head, looking at the clock on the bedside. It was fifteen minutes to seven, the amount of time he had to contemplate about those three words Jack told him the night before.

He loved him. He  _ loved  _ him. Gabriel was so caught unawares by that simple statement that for some moments after Jack confessed his brain denied that he had heard right. He was battling his own internal demons considering his relationship with Jack, slowly coming to terms that he too, was developing something that was getting far more intimate than a friendship with him, and he was wondering what that was going to mean for both of them in the future.

They were in a very dangerous line of work, a job where your loved ones and anyone you cultivated a close relationship with could be used to blackmail you and make you do what your enemy wanted, be used as a dangerously fragile negotiation tool. He always knew Jack had a crush on him - Ana never quite stopped teasing him about it - and he was always more than a little flattered by it, but he never quite thought it would become such a deep devotion, and now that he had actually confessed, he honestly had no idea how to go about it.

Gabriel was a problem solver. He was logical and methodical, and was very good at separating his emotions from his duties and responsibilities. It was why he was, arguably, the best spy in Blackwatch. He wasn’t a robot, and eventually he’d have had to process the emotions he had held back when the time called for it, but he had always bounced back. He knew what he was, what he had to sacrifice to become the man he was today, and he knew it was a job that someone had to do, to potentially sacrifice your own humanity for the greater good of the collective human race, but for the first time in his adult life, he had absolutely no fucking idea how to go about this.

Jack loved him. It was so quiet, so soft, but the sheer  _ conviction  _ in those words are what shook Gabriel more than anything, right to his core.  _ Jack loved him. _

And that mere thought terrified him, because of something ever happened to Jack, he honestly had no idea what he would ever do with himself.

The alarm clock begun ringing on the bedside, and his lover fidgeting in his arms jolted him out of his thoughts. He smiled gently, wondering what the day held for them. Maybe he could postpone his worries for later.

Maybe his worries weren’t even legitimate.

…

Why was his alarm honestly so annoying?

Jack frowned, his eyes still closed, as his alarm was still going off. He was about to literally smash the button to shut the thing up, but someone else did, and for a moment, in his confused state as he was waking up, his eyes popped open, and he was assaulted by lean muscle covered by black smooth skin. His mouth went dry.

Gabriel Reyes was  _ ethereal.  _

“Morning,” he said, his voice still hoarse. Gabriel smiled at him, kissing him on the forehead. Jack found himself blushing.

“Morning. Did you sleep well?”

Jack nodded, stretching his legs in the blanket, before fidgeting to get out and go to the shower.As he was in the shower, he began contemplating, especially about last night. He was still in awe how he had actually confessed. He had actually told Gabriel that he loved him. He knew how he felt for a while, knowing over time that his crush had slowly been developing into something more, but he never quite knew how he would express it. Gabriel was literally his dream man, and though he knew that he would vehemently deny it, he was so far above his league that him actually agreeing to not only sleep with him but also just...generally hang out and develop a friendship was something Jack never thought would happen, yet here he was.

He didn’t quite regret confessing last night, but Gabriel hadn’t really responded, and he was getting a little anxious about that. At least if he had rejected him then he would know where he was standing with him, and he would deal with his heartbreak accordingly. Then again, he knew Gabriel, knew how straight forward he was a person. If he really didn’t like him, he highly doubted he would have woken up in his arms like that, or even gotten that kiss atop his head. He blushed again. 

He finally got out of the shower and begun the dressing up process. He would sort out his feelings later. Right now, they had a mission to accomplish.

…

An and Xin stared at the documentation provided to them by Gabriel, who looked back at them, camly sipping his water. Xin squinted, looking from their brother, to Gabriel and back to their brother. They turned to An and they had a conversation in Mandarin, before turning back to Gabriel.

“I...how did you get this information?” An asked, still in shock. Gabriel raised an eyebrow.

“I’m here on behalf of World Bank for an audit. I asked for it.”

An looked at the information again. “How did you manage to correlate the legalities to the financials?”

Gabriel shrugged. “I asked.”

Xin raised his own eyebrow in turn, clearly skeptical. “You just asked for this information and they gave it to you? Along with any clarifications on it all?” He couldn’t hide the incredulity in his voice even if he tried.

Jack spoke up this time. “You really underestimate the diplomatic power the UN holds and generally how petty your government is.”

“And you’re sure that this will be enough to keep the Ministry of Finance busy long enough as we consolidate the information from the Triad?”

Gabriel and Jack leaned forward. “You’re the ones in the system. You tell us.” Gabriel’s voice was smoother than honey, and he noticed Xin blush.

An swallowed, shifting slightly in his chair, a little more flustered than he would have like. Jack was always awed how charming Gabriel could be. “This is...going to cause a very major scandal.”

Jack tapped the paper. “It is. That’s the point. There’s supposed to be a major scandal, because that’s what will cause pandemonium. In your government right now he’s the most trusted Talon member, no? So what would cause a ruckus big enough to ripple straight through the entire government, but not something too big that anybody below assistant ministers won’t be adversely affected other than wide scale corruption?”

“So naturally Talon will be involved. This is their one way ticket into controlling Beijing, and they cannot have him sabotaged in any way. They will call a meeting, and the big guys are gonna assemble somewhere around. I wagger Hong Kong or Macau, but they  _ will  _ be around. They can’t afford to fuck up in China. There’s far too much to lose in terms of international financial control. We’ve investigated Talon enough to understand they would rather sacrifice someone rather than have them jeopardise their world domination plans, even if he’s as important as you finance buddy here. Instead having us to go to them, why not bring them to us?” Gabriel added.

Again, there was astonished silence, with An and Xin looking at each other again.

“Talon are involved in this corruption scandal. How can they put someone on the spot like this then when things go wrong they just disown them?” An was finding it really hard to understand that Talon only cared about money and power.

Jack shrugged. “They’re capitalists. They have sold their souls for money and power. They don’t even care about  _ themselves.  _ I can guarantee you these people would sacrifice their own families to get more money and power. They have ever sacrificed each other. They would never hesitate to do it again. That’s just the vice of greed. It takes over everything that all you want is more.”

“Sombra told me that you were in another league, but this far beyond expectations.” Xin said, staring at the documentation one more time. One page of this could topple the entire political system in six hours. Heads would be rolling in Beijing. Literally.

Gabriel shrugged. “Not really. We’re just really good at our jobs. Like you guys.”

An, still in shock, spoke. “We’ll talk to the Triad. We’ll get back to you by midweek.”

Showtime.

…

Midweek found them back in Xin’s apartment, poring over Gabriel and Jack’s plans to do the assassinations. “It’s kind of risky, but it should definitely get their attention, and lead to the areas where they are likely to be sniped,” Gabriel said, his hand scratching his goatee.

Jack glanced at Gabriel, the tense body language, the consistent playing with his beard, the slow blinking, and he immediately knew that he was  _ stressed.  _ He honestly wondered if there was a way that he could ease that tension (in fact Jack could think of about six, all of them very inappropriate), but he was also well aware that Gabriel really wasn’t in that frame of mind. This wasn’t like Doha, where they completely lucked out and everything fell into place on it’s own, all they had to do was manipulate things a little bit, seize the opportunity and watch all the pieces fall into place.

Here, there was no such luck. In fact it was like the Fates had aligned with Talon this time, and everything was working for them.

An and Xin had done their part, in terms of talking to the head of the Triad. They had promptly informed him - anonymously, of course. Gotta cover your bases after all - that if he could provide the names of the Talon members that were giving him problems, then they would get rid of them and eliminate a whole slew of his problems. The response they got was really a weird kind of pleasant surprise.

It turns out that Madeleine was betrayed in Doha by one of the people she was working with. They encountered the Triad and for a good chunk of cash (twenty thousand dollars it was said after they were pestered enough) they sold her out to them, but by then she was still working with Gabriel and Jack, so they didn’t quite strike yet. They did, however keep constant tags on her. The Triad also strongly suspected that they were the ones that orchestrated and carried out the assassinations in Doha, but, of course, there was no proof. Naturally, he was dismissed thereafter by the Talon big guys, not really taken as seriously as he would have liked, something that they would come to regret.

The Triad then pounced when Gabriel and Jack had left, immediately trying to get rid of Madeleine, and it was through her attempted escape that she got in touch with Xin and fled to China. Through them she was able to get Sombra, who was able to get to Ana, who was able to get to them. At this point he was still trying to get some clout in Talon, and it really was not working at all, and he was getting tired with how vague they were being with him in terms of the plans they had when they were done with this world domination thing of theirs, so out of pettiness, he decided to expose the people who were important to Talon in these parts: Fai Liu, the current Finance Minister and Feng Zhang, the Chinese Talon representative on the Big Six.

The next thing to do in the grand scheme of things was find out where these freaks were going to be. They already knew who the targets were, now all they needed was locations so that they could do the more intricate planning. WIth An’s help, they figured out they would end up in (not surprisingly) Macau, a gambling haven, a great place to discuss their world domination plans without too much attention to them, because the other rich people would be too busy living life on the edge, trying to see how much of their wealth they could potentially lose (or gain) in a couple of hours.

Madeleine was going to be a pawn. Well, semi - pawn. One of the deals with the head of the Triad was that they would leave Madeleine the fuck alone. So she and Jack would go in and identify Liu and Zhang, lead them out of the casino, and then Jack and Gabriel would assassinate them. There would be four agents nearby ready for clean up, and Talon wouldn’t be able to find out until the next day by the earliest, and by then, Jack, Gabriel and Madeleine would be out of the country, An and Xin pretending they had no idea what the fuck had happened and doing any necessary alibi work.

It was extremely risky, but like all extremely risky plans, the reward was also exceptionally high. Talon missing two members of their famed six within less than six months of each other would be pretty disastrous.

They went through the plan one more time, everyone understanding their roles and knowing what they had to, questions being asked and answered. Jack and Gabriel were then taken back to their apartment and they immediately called Ana. It was going to be a long night.

Ana stared at them, not quite sure what to tell them. Naturally it was extremely risky, but the reward if they pulled it off could be more than what they needed, and it would buy them enough time to cripple Talon even more. They needed a longer rest period after this, it looked like, because at the rate they were going they would be badly tumbling into catastrophic really soon, and though the two of them were her best and she trusted and believed in them, this was going a little bit in over their heads, even for agents of their calibre.

“Alright then,” she said after a long pause. “I don’t know why I feel like something will go wrong, but for my own peace of mind let me just send some of our medics over. Just in case. You guys really lucked out in Doha, and we’ve been doing this job for long enough to know that that kid of luck never repeats itself. I’m giving you the okay because I trust you to take care of yourselves, each other, and our allies, but please don’t forget that you have support in the off chance that you may need it.All the best, and don’t any of you dare come back here in a body bag. I’ll never forgive you if you do.”

Both of them noticed the slight crack at the end of her voice, and it was at that moment that they realised just how complicated this entire mess was. They looked at each other, quietly bid each other goodnight and went to bed.

 


	14. A victory or a loss?

This was far worse than they expected.

Far, far worse.

“Jack! Jack! Morrison! Look at me!” Despite his sharp tone, Gabriel was barely holding it together. Frantic couldn’t begin to describe how he was feeling. He saw one of the medic’s mouth move, but he had no idea what he was saying. He could not hear a thing, the only sounds filling his ears being the roaring of his blood and Jack’s occasional groans. He felt, almost as if it was a dream, Madeleine’s reassuring rubs on his back, and all it did was make him more anxious.

Gabriel Reyes was a stranger to anxiety. He had no idea what to do, so his body opted to break down, his default when he was mentally unable to process what exactly was going on around him at the time in its entirety. A very rare occasion indeed.

He turned back to look at Jack, who seemed to be looking at him, but his gaze was glassy. He kept mumbling something about having the worst headache of his life, and him being dizzy. All Gabriel could do was run his hands through his hair, and reassure him that it was going to be alright, that he was going to be fine. Jack just nodded, before wincing, no doubt in pain.

They arrived at the hospital, and all Gabriel could do was helplessly watch him being wheeled inside to what he thought was an emergency room. For a moment he stood there, watching the white walls and white tiles of the hospital, bright lights everywhere and the doctors and nurses. Eventually a doctor and a translator came out (how long had it been? Two minutes? Two hours? Two days? He didn’t know) and explained to him that Jack was going to fine. He had just fractured his left baby finger and ring finger, and had a couple of scratches and a nasty concussion, but he should be released from the hospital the next day. He was requested to go home and get some rest.

He just nodded dumbly, the shock still getting to him. Jack had been injured in that blast. He  _ almost died _ , all because of some risky ass plan he came up with. He was told that perhaps they were gambling too much and he refused to listen, and as a result…

He suddenly saw a mass of red hair pop in his view, concerned green eyes staring up at him. He didn’t even realise that he had zoned out until Madeleine’s thick accented hit his brain.

“...need to take you home. You need to rest. We’ll come back and get Jack tomorrow,” she was saying, her voice gentle. Gabriel just nodded, managing a nod, before turning around and following her into the car. The tall buildings and clean streets of Macau seemed to just zoom past him, and soon they were at the hotel? Block of apartments? He didn’t know. Like a zombie he got out of the car, just following Madeleine. She asked him if he needed something to eat, and as if on auto pilot he just shook his head, his mouth unable to move. He was still in shock, he realised. He chuckled bitterly. At least that realisation made him recognise that he would be getting out of it soon, and then he would have to process his emotions.

He was operating on autopilot when he got into his room, slowly and carefully removing his clothes and getting into the bath. It was in there that everything that had happened within the last twenty four hours hit him and he broke down. This was the second time in his adult life that he had cried, and that thought seemed to make the tears flow faster. He had no idea how long he sat in the tub, sobbing as his shoulders heaved in tepid water, (time seemed to be something he was finding very difficult to catch up with, recently), but when the water started getting cold he thought that perhaps it was time for him to get out.

Wiping himself down and dressing up for bed was proving to be such a chore, since he was absolutely knackered, physically, mentally and emotionally, and he realised that his body was shutting down. He blacked out the moment his head hit the pillow into a deep, dreamless sleep.

…

Jack woke up with a start, blinking repeatedly at all the white around him: white walls, white lights, white sheets...there was so much white he thought his eyeballs were going to roll out of his head.

Despite his pounding headache (nothing else seemed to be paining, thank God) the first thing he thought of was  _ where is Gabriel _ ? He vaguely remembered seeing him some time ago after the explosion, and he seemed fine enough as was, but he just wanted to confirm it, just wanted to be  _ sure  _ that he was alright. 

He tried to sit up, ignoring the pounding that was going on in his head, when he realised it was literally impossible to move his two last fingers on his left hand, and when he looked at them he saw a tiny cast on them. Fractured fingers now, huh? Fucking great. Keeping that in mind he was able to properly sit up straight now, and he also realised that he could live with the headache that was literally on a mission to kill him, as long he could get the fuck out of this hospital as soon as possible and get home.

There was a quiet knock on the door, before two doctors and a nurse walked in. Jack just stared at them, hoping they would tell him what he wanted to hear.

“Good morning, Mr. Morrison. I’m glad you’re fine,” one of them begun. Jack just nodded in response, assuming that one of them could not speak English, and the one that was talking to him was here on translation purposes.

The doctor went on, telling him that according to observations he seemed to be doing really well, thought they requested if he could stay in the hospital one more day before releasing him. He was also assured not to worry about costs, as the United Nations, his employer would cater for those costs. (That was something that got his mind buzzing again). He however had some visitors that wanted to see him, and the doctor wanted to know what to tell them.

“Who are they?”

“They say their names are Gabri-”

“Let them in.”

The doctors seemed a little bit taken aback  by the sudden change in demeanour, going from anxious to anticipatory, but they nonetheless agreed and went and called the guests, who Jack wanted to see more than anything at this point. He needed that support and Gabriel was one of the few people who would give it to him.

He nearly jumped off the bed when Gabriel walked in, but Gabriel quickly rushed to his side of the bed, hugging him, mumbling his name under his breath as Madeleine, who had accompanied them, respectfully stood on the side and allowed them to have their moment. It was after that he struggled off the bed, his legs slightly wobbly from not having been able to walk for a while, and pulled her into a bear hug. She was extremely surprised at first, especially at the force that she was pulled in, but she returned the embrace, saying she was glad that he was okay.

“Jackie I am so, so sorry,” Gabriel begun, before anyone could say anything. Madeleine looked between the two of them, and immediately recognised that perhaps she shouldn’t be in here at this time. She quickly excused herself, saying that she would be waiting for Gabriel outside, and smiling brightly at Jack telling him that she hoped she would come and collect him tomorrow to take him home, and left. Both Gabriel and Jack appreciated her giving them that privacy, and the immediately continued with their conversation.

“You were right. The plan was too risky. I should have listened and we could have thought of something else. Instead you ended up injured. If anything could ha - “ he choked on his words, his face falling in his open hands, unable to continue. He was overwhelmed with emotion, and even Jack could see that. He swallowed, wondering if he was really being an asshole continuing in the vein he was thinking of.

“You know, Gabe, I really wonder if you could have changed your mind either way. You could have come up with another excuse. Maybe it was too late to think of something else, or that we’d have to involve other people or there was too much risk with having to postpone this. Maybe you really needed me to nearly die for you to really come to your senses.”

The mood in the room shifted, going to decidedly more tense. Gabriel looked up at Jack, really eyeballed him, and it was then that Jack saw how  _ tired  _ Gabriel really was. He had circles under his eyes, which were slightly bloodshot. Even his clothes weren’t as neat as normal: his shirt button at the top was undone, he had no cufflinks so his sleeves were loose, his jacket was slightly scruffy, his pants a little creased. Even his shoes weren’t polished. He highly doubted he had gotten any sleep the previous night.

“Jack,” Gabriel begun, and Jack felt every last strand of hair on his neck stand on end. There was something very terrifying about the eerie calmness in the way he said his name. “Are you honestly going to sit there and say that I deliberately planned this and had absolutely no contingencies in place and insisted on this plan for the sole purpose of you getting injured?”

His voice was so soft, so quiet. Jack was speechless, completely unable to respond. In truth he was slightly hurt that Gabriel would come to that conclusion.

“Of course the fuck not. I’m just saying that you wouldn’t have listened because you doubled down on your decision.”

Gabriel sat back straight, hands crossed on his chest, left ankle on his right knee. Jack felt like his rib cage was about to be ripped apart by his pounding heart.

“I’m going to ignore you claiming that I would never have listened at all. I don’t even want to know how you came to that conclusion. I’m going to go straight to me doubling down on my decision to proceed with this plan.” Jack was about to open his mouth but Gabriel would not give him a chance. “You are right. I doubled down on that decision, and as a result four innocent people were injured, excluding you. As much as I want to go and apologise to them personally, I can’t, for reasons you are well aware of. Xin, however has confirmed that the are doing well and will make a full recovery. I came straight here, as soon as the hospital allowed me to to apologise for doubling down on that plan. I know you aren’t entitled to accept my apology, but to act that I deliberately went out of my way to hurt you is really blowing shit way too far.”

“I’m not blowing jack shit,  _ Gabriel, _ ” Jack snapped, venom slipping into the way he said Gabriel’s name. Gabriel winced. “All I’m saying is because you believe that you're the best agent we got you think your decisions can go unquestioned.”

Gabriel just looked at him,  _ right  _ at him, and Jack has never felt that exposed in his life. Even through his exhaustion Gabriel’s gaze could pierce real, raw diamonds. “Let me ask you something, Jack.” That soft voice again, deceptively polite, cordial. Jack could almost see the rage bubbling beneath those words. “Tell me, who is the one that said I’m the best agent in this organisation?”

Jack opened his mouth, but then closed it again. Gabriel had a point. He had never called himself the best. He never claimed that he was the best, he realised. It was always Ana that said it, or the other agents. Even Jack himself had said that Gabriel was the best. Gabriel always maintained that he was simply good at his job, and that he had done some pretty monumental fuck ups because he was just as human as the rest of them. He never,  _ ever  _ claimed to be the best.

At that exact moment, Jack felt the trap snap in his head, and it was his won fault for walking right into it.

“It’s extremely interesting, Jack, something that, in my opinion needs a study even, that you can see every single one of  _ your  _ flaws in  _ me.  _ Is this some kind of weird projection or what? Because I really don’t understand this, sudden vindictive rage you’re directing at me. You have every right to be angry at me for being the indirect cause of your injuries, but to go ahead and level all manner of accusations that you know  _ very well  _ had absolutely no relation to this bullshit is just...out of fucking nowhere.”

Jack said nothing, staring at his hands, his jaw ticking, bitterness the only thing he could feel at this point.

“ _ You  _ were the only one that questioned this plan, so I really don’t understand who ‘everyone’ is in this scenario. You’re here claiming that I never listen to any opinions - a fucking bold lie, because between the two of us we know who has issues listening to other people’s opinions - and then use that as a basis of claiming that’s why I never changed this plan, despite me telling you about this plan, showing you how it would work, and then telling you of my other contingencies.”

Jack saw a liquid drop on his hand, and it was then that he realised he was crying. He heard, rather than saw Gabriel stand up and leave his room, and for the first time in almost a decade, Jack buried his face in his pillow and bawled his eyes out.

What had he done?

…

Gabriel was overwhelmed with hurt and rage. His body at this point didn’t know exactly how to feel. He barked at Madeleine to leave him alone and go home, and that if he wanted anything he would get back to her himself. He didn’t mean to sound harsh, because he saw the slight fear in her body language when he was talking to her, but he really just...wasn’t in the mood at this point. He didn’t even pause to see if she was following. It was very rude of him, he knew, but he was too emotionally overwhelmed at this point to bother with acceptable social skills.

How had they gotten to this point?

He remembered meeting with everyone before the assassinations would take place. Liu and Zhang would be in a certain casino, seemingly gambling away recreationally, but in actuality they were scouting the place, seeing if it would be an appropriate establishment for Talon to purchase. They had requested Ana to send in two snipers with her mini army of medics, and within three days they had scouted the area, found out where to set up for their jobs, and planned the route out.Everyone had their allies in check, and they got to work.

Things were going well, according to plan, Liu and Zhang being promptly killed and there being the requisite pandemonium in the casino until they were in the car. Gabriel, looking like a business gambler called for an uber, while Jack and Madeleine took the getaway car, the car that was set up to explode after ten minutes of the engine running, but their driver, who said he was replacing Jones, the very first driver provided by Xin when they first got to Shanghai. He was the one that managed to send a quick text to Jack, who only managed to push all three passengers out, before jumping out himself and the car blowing the fuck up to the moon.

It was a victory, but a somewhat pyrrhic one. No lives were lost, but they lost a whole lot of time. This was gonna be great explaining to Ana.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been about 6 centuries, I know. I was working on my BB, and then my brain broke, and then lack Panther happened and the planning of fics that I haven't even written a letter for. Ya know how it goes.
> 
> Anyway, enjoy. Or not. I can't tell you what to do.


	15. Making up and moving on

Ana’s heart tugged at watching Gabriel look like this. Reinhardt had cracked some absolutely horrible jokes. Gabriel had laughed at some. He was salvageable at least.

“I’m glad that things turned out relatively normal, Gabriel, and I’m also glad to hear that you achieved all your objectives for the mission. Good job. I know Jack will be fine, and you should also take advantage of his time in hospital to go rest. I will be expecting your written reports forty eight hours after you both land in Zurich, then we can take the next step.” Gabriel realised that her voice was softer than normal, and he knew it was because his fatigue was written all over his face. He truly needed to sleep. He was just about to end the call when Rein asked him to stay, before turning to Ana and asking her to please leave for a moment because he needed to have a private conversation with Gabriel.

When Ana had gently closed the door, Gabriel sagged.

“He hates me,” he said quietly. “He hates me, Rein. I don't know what to do.”

Reinhart just looked at him like an older brother comforting his younger brother from his first break up. Seeing the ever clam and in control Gabriel just so... _ defeated  _ broke his heart and hurt his soul.

“He does not hate you, my friend. In fact he still loves you, just as deeply as he always did.” Reinhardt wasn’t quite as boisterous as usual. He knew Gabriel would not appreciate it.

“He almost died.” He choked. Reinhardt wished he could reach through the screen and pull him into a hug.

“But he didn’t. You both made sure, because you vere the first one there to ensure that he was fine and that he got medical attention, and now all he’ll get out of it vith nothing but two broken fingers. A decent exchange, no?”

Gabriel managed to crack a small smile through his tears.

“I suppose.”

“Good,” he boomed, clapping his hands together. “Go cry. It is healthy. Then go talk to him tomorrow. Vith your mouths, to each other, not your dicks.”

Gabriel choked again, but this time Reinhardt was sure it wasn’t due to grief. “Thank you Reinhardt.”

“You’re very welcome, my friend.”

…

Jack was still tired. He had slept for about ten hours, and now he was about to leave. Gabriel wasn’t here, instead Madeleine and Xin were the ones who came round to get him. He pretended not to be too hurt.

“Hey,” Xin said delicately, putting their hand on his shoulder. “Are you feeling a little bit better today?”

Jack smiled. These guys genuinely cared for him. He truly appreciated that. It felt good and helped fill the void that maybe the one man he had grown to love now hated him.

“I am, thank you. I’ve just got some work to do when I get back and that’s what’s occupying my mind right now,” he said. It was a half truth at least. They deserved that for coming all the way to get him.

They both nodded, before helping him take his stuff to the car. The drive back to the apartment was in comfortable silence, and Xin and Madeleine escorted him to the door. Jack took a deep breath before getting into the house. He found Gabriel sitting on the couch, cross-legged and staring down at his tablet, taking notes by hand. He read something, before pausing and scribbling his notes in a notebook. He looked up at him for about half a minute, then went back to his work. Jack swallowed his bitterness.

“Uh, hello Gabe.” His voice sounded small, because as far as he was concerned, the man he had come to love probably despised him.

“Hello Jack.” He wasn’t expecting him to respond, honestly. He never even sounded antagonistic, and he knew Gabriel well enough at this point that if he wanted nothing to do with him it would be very clear in his voice. At least that was something. His heart fluttered a little bit when he realised that perhaps there might be a chance.

“I’m sorry. I don’t feel fresh. Please give me a moment to go and have a shower. I...um, want to talk to you.” He could hear some of his confidence come back.

Gabriel just nodded, before looking up at him. “Of course. Take your time. Welcome back home.”

Jack blushed, mumbling his thanks before dashing into his room with his stuff. As he undressed and headed into the shower, he couldn’t help but think where he would start, where he would end. He knew he was the one on the wrong, and he knew he would most definitely have to apologise, but he quite wasn’t sure where it would go from there. He sighed, as the hot water hit his skin, noticing that he was starting to go red from all the heat from the steam. He supposed it was time to find out.

…

Gabriel was...he wasn’t sure what he was feeling, but he knew there was some amusement in there. Confusion maybe? Definitely exasperation.

He was still definitely cute when he blushed like that though.

He didn’t know exactly what he wanted to talk about, but he had an idea that it was about their confrontation a couple of days ago in the hospital. God that was a mess. He sighed, going back to his rough draft for this aspect of the mission. It was honestly unbelievable how much detail this particular mission had, and if he left any of it out then it really wouldn’t check out. Gabriel at this point was pretty tired of all of this and wanted this mission in particular to end because he was very tired and it seemed as though this mission was going on forever.

As he was still in his thoughts, Jack finally came out of the shower. His hair was still slightly damp, and he had on a simple, grey t shirt and black basketball shorts. He most definitely did not have any underwear on, because Gabriel could see the outline of his dick print and he had to close his eyes and swallow for a second. He was supposed to be angry at him and yet he was sitting here thinking how good it would feel to take his entire dick whole and have him scream his name.

God he was gay.

Just then, Jack walked out of the shower, in his trademark shorts, t shirt and fluffy shoes, and Gabriel moved his stuff off the couch to make room for him to sit. He sighed as he sat down, silent for a moment, most likely trying to collect his thoughts.

“I’m sorry, Gabe,” he begun, looking at his hands. Gabriel only tilted his head slightly to the left in response. “I’m sorry for saying all those things to you. I know you wouldn’t go out of your way to put me or anyone else in danger. I was just still pissed off I guess, and in my rage I said all that shit knowing that I should not and that it wasn’t true. I made you lash out at me, and I wanna apologise for that too.”

Gabriel just looked at him, smiling slightly to himself. He never expected Jack to apologise so soon, knowing what kind of person he was. He either really, truly loved him (fact) or he felt being this awkward together when they still had a lot of work to do his best course of action would be to apologise.

“Thank you Jack. I accept your apology. You’re good.”

Jack’s face brightened, as he quietly said his thanks. “In fact, Gabriel said, putting all his paperwork away and moving close to Jack. Jack wondered how the fuck his face was still red when all his blood had drained to his dick. “I think there is a better way you can apologise.”

Jack should have been ready. He should have fully expected what came next, but for some reason he wasn’t prepared. He had barely blinked, barely opened his mouth to speak when Gabriel leaned in and kissed him, devoured his mouth with an intensity that had Jack nearly choking. Jack’s hands were still flailing when Gabriel grabbed his waistband and pulled him on his lap, forcing Jack to brace himself against his chest and their kiss to get a little more sloppy, teeth clanking against each other. Gabriel was the first to break and he giggled, as Jack took the chance to adjust himself properly and grind down. Needless to say the laughter turned into one of Gabriel more lecherous sounds. Jack had seriously missed that sound.

Gabriel’s brain had turned into a puddle of goo at the base of his skull. He could kind of register what was happening, but he wanted Jack to know that he would be the one doing the fucking this evening. He took a deep breath, blinking and his brain finally registered that Jack had, at some point, removed his own shirt, throwing it somewhere on the floor and was struggling to remove him. Gabriel managed a chuckle, taking his shirt off himself before leaning up for another kiss.

Jack was distracted, and Gabriel could tell from the blissful sigh in his mouth, so he took this chance to shove his hand in his shorts, coming into contact with his rapidly hardening dick. He couldn’t really see it but he could imagine what it looked like, thick, slightly red, probably leaking and he groaned, muffling a curse as he stroked it a couple of times. Jack whined, running his hands down Gabriel’s torso, loving the feel of compact muscle under smooth skin, and if he didn’t have that good a grip against his thighs he probably would have fallen off his lap.

Gabriel could feel himself getting hard, and he figured, somehow through his lust addled mind, it was time to get all their clothes off. As he was still trying to figure out how coherent words worked, he felt a large hand, warm and a little rough stroking his dick in that slow way he always did,  and Gabriel nearly lost it. He closed his eyes, jaw clenched because if Jack continued this…

“Fuck,  _ cariño,  _ bed. Now.”

Jack wanted more than anything to indulge his lover, but his legs had turned to jelly. With willpower he managed to stand up and wiggle out of his shorts, before pulling Gabriel up from the chair and very nearly ripping his pants off, and pulling him through the apartment, into the nearest room that had furniture that resembled a bed.Gabriel pulled him in for another kiss (there had been a lot of kisses, lately, Jack noticed, his mouth mashed against Gabriel’s, each one more intense than the other) and with that contact they realised that they were finally  _ naked,  _ and they could not get their hands off each other: on their chests, stomachs, backs, shoulders, bums, thighs...they were literally all over each other.

Jack’s calfs hit the edge of the bed and he fell over, with Gabriel falling on top of him pulling himself off his mouth and heading straight for his neck. Jack let some sound out, something between a moan and a sigh, as Gabriel ground against him. He could literally feel his soul ascending into the heavens.

“Sweetheart. Luke. Where is it?”

Gabriel, his mouth still nipping and sucking and intent on leaving at least one mark on Jack’s skin stretched out towards his bedside, pulling it open and removing the lube. He loved how they were both so gone in each other they could barely communicate properly. He sat up, watching Jack panting, his entire body flushed, half - lidded blue eyes slightly cloudy, mouth parted, looking up at him with blatant lust. Gabriel swallowed, licking his lips as he closed his eyes, wondering who the entire  _ fuck  _ gave goddamn the Morrison the bloody right to look at him like that.

As he was busy with the lube, Jack wrapped his legs around him, pulling him closer and slightly lifting himself off the bed. Gabriel, trying his hardest not to look Jack in the face (which amused him more than anything) spread open Jack’s legs more and slipped a finger in, slowly until his third knuckle. Jack bit his lip, lifting himself more off the bed, as Gabe pulled out slowly then pushing back in. He let out some sound, something between a growl and a moan, and gabriel, smiling gently, pushed a second finger in, at awe of absolutely how tight Jack was, his bum muscles literally pushing against his fingers.

“Now?” Gabriel managed, his voice breathy.

“Jack nodded frantically, trying to agree but his vocal cords refusing to work with him. Gabriel pulled his fingers out, still dripping with lube, as he took more, slathering it onto his own cock. He held Jack’s hips up, before slipping himself in, slowly, as both he and Jack sighed in absolute pleasure. He reached the hilt, pausing for a moment, before pulling back out again. He created a rhythm, slowly pulling in and out of his lover, watching his blass jiggle from the movement, so awed by how effortlessly he took him. His eyes were closed, but he had clutched the sheets like a lifeline below him, his toes now on the bed and also curled into the sheets.

Jack knew he could perfectly fit Gabriel like a glove, but this,  _ this  _ was an entirely different temptation. He could always easily adapt to past lovers, but he had yet to meet someone that could stretch him to his utter limits like Gabriel was right now. Not to mention his  _ stroked.  _ God these stroked were gifted to him by Adonis himself. Where in the shit did he learn how to fuck like this? Jack’s brain may not have been function but these slow, deep thrusts were promptly reminding him what he was doing and who he was doing it with. His body felt lighter than a feather, at the same time there was molten heat flowing all over him.

As he was reaching out to grab something after one particularly smooth stroke, his hand hit the lube tube.Gabriel then took it, slathered some more on his hand after he paused for a moment (Jack grumbled here, before Gabriel reassured him to calm down) and wrapped Hack’s legs around his hips, and as jack’s mind was still trying to register what was going on, he felt a hand on his cock, large and warm, with some chill from the lube.

Jack opened his mouth, but no sound came out. The combination of Gabriel’s strokes and his hand on his dick, jerking him off was far too much. With a light whimper and a very shameless moan of Gabriel’s name he came, shuddering on the bed as he spilled himself all over Gabriel’s hand onto his abs. Gabriel watching this, couldn’t quite keep it together himself. Watching his lover come in his hand really was quite something, so all it took was one more stroke and he felt his balls tighten before he himself came, shuddering with clenched teeth as he tried to not shake too much to keep his balance.

Afterwards, Gabriel dropped onto Jack, both of them a mess of bodily fluids, exhausted, sated and happy, rolling both him and his lover into the covers of the bed, not even thinking about the cleanup that awaited them and promptly falling asleep. Everything else would follow tomorrow.

They both absolutely could not wait.


	16. Bringers of Chaos

Things were going far too fast at this point. They were both getting real old for this.

They were woken up the next morning by a call from Ana. When she saw them, a tangled mess in the bed she raised her eyebrow, but opted to say nothing, and told them their flight was in two days, so they could rest up and organise themselves, as she finished things up with An and Xin. An and Xin were also expected to debrief them on the same day, as there was a little bit of chaos in China. The Finance Minister had been assassinated in macau after all, amongst other powerful international dignitaries, and the Chinese and macau governments were working together to investigate. She ended with a congratulations to them for a job well done, and hang up before they could explain just how and why they had ended up in their particular situation. Both of them sighed when she was the first to switch off the transaction on her end, and opted to cuddle instead.

However, they were a mess after the previous night’s romping, so they decided to take a shower (together, as per Jack’s suggestion. Gabriel knew it was a bad idea, but at the time the blood that was supposed to be sustaining his mind was sustaining his dick so he went along with it) and then go for breakfast, and hopefully by the time they finished their room would be cleaned, and they could go back and just hang out. This was just about the only free day they had left in China, and they had every intent to take full advantage of it.

…

“You guys were really living it up, aren’t you? Perhaps I should also consider a United Nations post?” An said, looking around the lobby of the hotel they were in, whistling lowly. “If this is what the lobby looks like, I wonder how luxurious the rooms are.”

Gabriel and Jack chose not to respond to that, instead letting his imagination take root.

“We would appreciate if this debrief went a bit fast. We still gotta pack, since our flight out is a bit early,”Jack said instead, making himself comfortable and reaching for one of the bread sticks. Xin nodded, sitting opposite him and beginning the point of this meeting.

Apparently Talon was in a terrible mess. In fact they had pulled out of Asia a s a whole, as their two worst disasters had happened on the continent, so they were going to be in London for a while to regroup.A lot of things had been exposed after the deaths of Liu and Zhang, and the Chinese government was in a crisis. The citizens had grown accustomed to a lot of accountability from their political class over the years, and the strict punishments that had been meted on corrupt individuals, particularly civil servants, so this really did bring a fresh uproar and a heavy loss of confidence on the government. They had nothing to worry about on that end. Talon would be busy in terms of explaining to the Chinese government for a while.

There seemed to be particular outcry and demands on Zhang, which would mena risking Talon’s exposure. It was honestly a lot to deal with, for both the Chinese government and Talon. It seemed the censoring of information did not quite seem to be working out.

“Madeleine’s gone back to Glasgow, because Talon has gone to regroup in London. However, according to Sombra, there’s something brewing in Africa. I told your boss as such, and I honestly think it’s something you should go and have a look at.” An said, looking seriously at them. Gabriel and Jack decided to believe him. He always seemed to look out for the interests of his country, and they knew the stakes that the Chinese government was taking in investing in Africa.

At the end, they exchanged greetings again, and wished each other good luck. It was time to go back to Zurich.

…

Ana and Reinhardt looked a lot better than when they last saw them. It’s like they weren’t quite as stressed. Of course it also be the fact that this particular mission went somewhat without a hitch.

“Hello boys. Welcome back to Zurich. I hope you’ve had a good rest.” Ana was oddly pleasant, after standing up on her toes and having to be literally lifted to kiss her husband on the cheek and told him to get back to work. Gabriel and Jack  honestly didn’t know how to feel about that. Obviously they knew she was happy about the mission, but just by that calmness in her voice it was clear that there was a lot more she had to say. Another one of the reasons she was so brilliant at her job was because she always had information filtering in to her twenty four hours, whether or not she was awake, and she was so excellent at information gathering and organisation that even when she woke she was able to get in touch with everything she needed in a very short amount of time, and that was how she was always in the know of everything at all times.

It was very scary  how good she was at her job, which was why she was easily one of the most dangerous spies both Gabriel and Jack knew.

“Come come. There is a lot we need to catch up on.”

Oh boy.

They took a seat in her office, gratefully thanking her after she brewed some coffee and gave each one of them a cup. Gabriel liked the strong smell and taste, when Jack always winced after taking a sip of it.

“Now, I managed to get some more information on your merry mission to Beijing, which can also explain how and why things might have been a little more difficult for you over there.”

Hmm. That explained a lot.

“After out shenanigans in Doha, Talon has been very suspicious of what is going on, so they assigned the rest of their representatives with spies that would be feeding them with information in their respective turfs. These spies are, predictably, brain-washed, but very thoroughly trained individuals for the sole purpose of information gathering. The reason it was a little more difficult for you to get to Talon and why it seemed as though they were always just slightly ahead was because they most likely were, because they always had this info that could enable them to plan ahead.”

That seemed to make sense, Gabriel and Jack thought as they sipped their coffee. In fact Gabriel was already trying to think what exactly a Talon spy would look like, see if he could have, perhaps, chance encountered them at any one point during the mission.

“So we want you to keep an eye on that during this last leg. The particular spy that was living it big between Beijing, Shanghai and Macau with you guys was this bloke.”

On her screen was a white man, bald, grey eyes, thin lips. A couple of scars on his forehead and temple. Completely smooth, not a single trace of facial hair. He was scowling, as if he was angry at whoever it was that had taken his picture.He triggered something in Jack’s memory.

“He was at our hotel. He liked hanging out a lot at the lobby. He always looked like he wanted to approach Madeleine a couple of times, but was apprehensive because she was never alone at any one point.”

There was a slight silence in the room, as it suddenly dawned on the three of them just how bad of a catastrophe that could have been had it happened. Nonetheless, Ana changed the image on the screen, to the information of this spy of theirs.

His name was Klaus Anderson, a white South African man, who apparently was looking for “better opportunities” abroad since he was being “discriminated against”. The coded bigotry was not lost on either of them, but that really wasn’t the point of this meeting. “He must have been really desperate to get out if he allowed himself to be recruited by nameless adn faceless entities to go out in a country where he didn’t know the language or culture and gather information about people his big bosses weren’t even sure about.”

“Where is he now?” Gabriel asked calmly, already knowing the answer.

“Dead. He was part of the unfortunate explosion that you guys orchestrated in Macau. That casin you were at was owned by the Talon big man’s son, so I guess that’s another blow to them. Congratulations, by the way. You dealt a massive blow to them on that end too, as the money that was laundered in that casino is probably more than some countries GDPs. Despite how much stress this particular leg of the mission gave you you seemed to really go in, huh?”

Jack shrugged, half a smile on his lips. “I mean, we do try.”

Ana chuckled for a moment, before getting serious again. “Either way, that’s another cripple to Talon as an organisation. Apparently that Feng dude was also pretty badass, but SOmbra said she’s going to talk to us about that later. Now, I want to talk to you about what’s happening here with our beloved boss Petras.”

Oh? Now this was going to be an interesting debrief.

“He’s going insane. He’s literally slowly and systematically losing his mind. Talon is excellent at psychological destruction because of how they use your own weaknesses to reel you in. Petras is extremely egotistical and needs attention on him all the time, to take away the fact that his insanely insecure and the fact the only reason he’s where he is is because of the positions of power and influence of his parents. Once you take that away from him he will have absolutely no idea what to do with himself. Talon is completely refusing to interact with him. They aren’t even giving him orders. He’s barely holding himself together at this point, and the only reason overwatch is still running is partly because most of the duties here are extremely routine and planned for months in advance and partly because it’s under the umbrella of the United Nations. It would have been satisfying had it not been pitiful.”

A sombre silence settled the three of them in the office.

“It’s a method of self destruction,” Gabriel said slowly. “Talon has every intention to let him waste away so that when they eliminate him it won’t be too obvious that it was a murder.”

This was their enemy. This was the organisation they were fighting against. They were well aware thg Talon did not value anyone’s humanity, including their own, but to think it would get this bad…

“They have already chosen his replacement, haven’t they.” It was supposed to be a question, but the way Jack said it, so deadpan and flat, it actually came out as a statement.

Ana looked at him, before directing her gaze to Gabriel. “They have yes. I’m not quite sure who it is yet, but I’ll find out and let you both know as soon as possible. Obviously it’s going to be another Talon operative.”

There was more silence as they contemplated this information. Just then, there was an incoming call from Sombra. Ana’s fingers immediately flew all over her keyboard, most likely completely securing her office before she took the call.

“Hello Sombra,” Ana said dryly. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

Sombra was staring in another directions, her hands unseen but they could hear her typing on her keyboard. Her lollipop moved from one end of her mouth to the other, as she went on typing. With how much sugar she ate it was a wonder she still had her teeth and her tonsils.

“Sorry, give me a minute,” she mumbled, still typing away. After a few moments she looked to them, the playfulness still reflected in her eyes but the rest of her features serious.

“Talon is a mess. Not entirely crippled that it might disband, but crippled enough that the big guys are in a serious crisis. You truly are the bringers of chaos. Well done.”

Well, that was something they weren’t quite expecting to hear.

“Where do you want me to start: Feng Zhang, China’s former Talon Rep, or Talon right now?”

Ana nodded once. “Let’s start with Zhang.”

“He was from Shenzhen, born and bred. Nothing too remarkable about him. He simply knew the right people to climb corporate China. He was just one of those people that was always incredibly lucky, particularly in terms of jobs. He married well, allowing himself to be taken into the family of one of China’s wealthiest men, though aforementioned patriarch was always weary at how determined he was to reach the top, always telling him that one day his ambition would be the cause of his undoing. Old man wasn’t particularly wrong at that point.”

She stopped, taking her lollipop out of her mouth and waving it around as she continued speaking.

“Anyway, this man, so ambitious to rise to be at the very top, and having had a taste of what being stupidly rich could do, never wanted it to end. In other words, he was consumed by greed, and at this point he had forsaken his humanity - or what was left of it - and was willing to do anything to maintain the level of wealth that he had attained. He had resorted to fraud and more than once had caused the downfall of others just to secure more money for himself, not even for his family or his in-laws, just himself.”

Ana, Gabriel and Jack could almost see where there were getting with this, and it was not good.

“Wife, or ex wife,  I should say, was starting to get spooked by this behaviour, so she divorced him. He cared less, because he was getting all the money he wanted. By this time he had already been spotted by Talon, and recruited. His charm, wits, and ruthlessness eventually got him to the top, but when he got there he found that it was very difficult to maintain his status quo unless he had some serious financial backing. So he kidnaps his ex wife and threatens to murder her if they don’t remarry. SHe became a prisoner in her own mansion, with all the luxury she ever wanted, but not allowed to leave unless she was with her husband. He got onto the Big Six, and he was the second most powerful man after ibn La’Asid, and you guys having taken him out means China is down one representative, one of their powerhouses, and one of their only connections into the Chinese marketplace.”

Ana turned to look at her agents, her eyebrow raised and half a smile on her face. Despite the explosion in Macau causing quite a number of injuries, all non fatal and all victims would eventually recover, but in the grand scheme of things, Talon took the heaviest blows. An ally of thiers lost his business, and two crucial members of theirs were killed, including a high ranking spy. All in all she had to consider it at least some level of success.

“Great. Now, tell us about Talon.”

Well, this was gonna be a trip.


	17. London here they come

Oh boy.

“Uh, are you guys okay?” Sombra sounded like she was slightly concerned, which was understandable considering Ana, Gabriel and Jack had not spoken or reacted for the past twenty or so minutes. All they did was stare at their hands, no doubt thinking about the next step. She knew they were a little bit shocked about the news on Talon, but she honestly never thought they would be hit  _ this  _ hard.

Ana was the first one to respond. “Sorry Sombra. We’re fine. We’re just trying to figure out the next course of action.” She looked up at her, offering her a tired smile. Sombra just nodded.

“Alright. I’m just gonna leave now then.”

She left the call, leaving the room in contemplative silence again.

Gabriel was the first one to speak up. “I think we all need some time to process all of this. A lot has been happening all at the same time, so perhaps we gotta break it down into bits and understand it then, then we can come back tomorrow and get everything together, then plan on our next course of action.”

Ana and Jack nodded, agreeing, before she dismissed them. This was all far too much.

Talon was plagued by infighting at the top, something Ana, Gabriel and Jack (even Sombra, actually) never thought would happen. In retrospect, it was about time too, because most of the people up there were exactly the same kind of person, just seperated by nationality, language and culture. They were all extremely wealthy, egotistical and abrasive, extremely intelligent, and very used to getting what they wanted and having things go their way because money talked, and they knew this and they used it to their advantage. Ass the late La’Asid said, everyone in the world had a price, and each and every single one of them was convinced they could individually meet these prices.

What they never expected, however, was that perhaps there might be external forces that had infiltrated them and was what was contributing to this mess they were in. Hubris really was a cancer.

They had all gotten to London, but they had not met yet. SOme members had simply refused to come to meetings so that they could sit down and brainstorm what was happening and solve their issues. This went to show how fickle they were, how inherently weak they were, and the only reason they tolerated each other was because things had been going smoothly for the past decade or so.

As a result of all of this, the spy programme they had before had been suspended. All the spies had been told to await their next assignments, and they had just been hanging around in London, doing pretty much nothing as far as their agenda was. One of them, however, had hired a private investigator, a very good one from Germany according to Sombra, to investigate  _ everyone else.  _ They were so distrustful of each other that they were firmly convinced that this sabotage was internal, since they thought one of them was leaking information outward which explained how and why they lost two of their most powerful members within a span of about ten weeks.

Of course, there was the issue of the next Director of Overwatch.

Ana had done some sleuthing, and it turned out that the next Director that was going to replace Petras was just as bad, if not worse than him.

Probably worse.

Her name was Cecily Simard. She is French Canadian from Matane, Quebec. She was the first female head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Agency, and she was also known as the Witch, because the worst record of human rights violations happened the entire time she was at the helm. She absolutely despised anyone that was not white, straight, cisgender and rich, which pretty much explained exactly how and why she ended up at Talon.

She was also, very unsurprisingly, a strong believer in eugenics. Ana had not even met her but she already knew she was going to be trouble. Her pending appointment to the organisation meant it was going to be very soon until Petras was eliminated, and Ana did not want to act in any way until she met this woman, and plan sending Gabriel and Jack to London until then. 

So for now, all they had to do was wait.

…

Reinhardt predicted where and how it would happen. He never quite managed to predict  _ when. _

Which was, essentially the problem. They all thought they were prepared for it, and to some extent they probably were, but they weren’t quite prepared for the sheer brutality and how near in the future it would end up.

“Zey are going to make it look like a suicide,” he told them all quietly in Ana’s office. Ana was stirring her coffee, Jack was on the internet, Gabriel had bit into a caramel slice, and he was looking at a paper, talking about the deteriorating health of the current Director of Overwatch, still distraught about the loss of his wife, whom he loved and cherished very much. “Zey will torture him when he’s still alive, removing all forms of properly identifying him: grinding ze tops of his molars flat, slicing ze tops of his fingertips, and blinding him, zen zey will slowly kill him, a toxic poison, then remove all traces of that toxin, and then set the stage for a suicide. Because it’s overwatch they will do an internal post mortem, and release a statement. We will wait ze mandatory week, and Simard will take over.”

Just as he predicted, that’s how it happened. He was found floating, face down, off the coast of Genoa, about a mile from his private yacht. His body was airlifted to Overwatch headquarters for a post mortem, and his death was ruled suicide by drowning. Ana sneaked in a Blackwatch doctor that she trusted where they kept his body, and he ruled it was a murder. His neck was slit, but they stuffed it back and did some reconstructive surgery and made it look like a suicide. All ways of DAN tracing were eliminated, so his family could not be told immediately until after the press conference.

Neither of them was particularly fond of him, but all of them did agree that how he was killed was inhumane, which increased their resolve to utterly destroy Talon.

So now, Ana had a meeting with Simard. She had a mic in her clothes, so that Reinhardt, Gabriel and Jack could listen in privately in Reinhardt’s office. She could never trust this woman with a pavement pebble, and considering she had a background in secret service, she knew she had to be extra careful.

It was a while after she put on her mic that they finally heard her talk. They assumed she just needed to get past the receptionist first.

“Good morning, operative Amari.” Somewhat high soprano. Clipped, subtly condescending. Obviously authoritative. Relatively thick accent. Gabriel smirked. She was threatened by Ana. He didn’t even need to be in the room to gather this much.

“Good morning, director.”

All three of them had to visibly stop themselves from laughing. Jack had his palm over his mouth, Gabriel took a sip of water, and Reinhardt was grinning widely. Ana knew. She  _ knew.  _ She could tell that this woman was intimidated by her, she knew she was going to go out of her way to frustrate her, and Ana was ready. Petty could play petty, and Ana’s quiet but confident response to that greeting said more than enough to everyone, most likely including Simard.

“I have been looking forward to meeting you,Captain Amari. There are some things I would like to discuss, particularly in regards to how you run Blackwatch.”

There was a silence here. Ana was brutal, and Simard was going to learn of that today.

“Likewise.”

All three of them snorted. God she wasn’t even trying and they were honestly living.

“I would like you tell me everything about what you do and why you are important in this organisation.”

She had somewhat composed herself, but they could hear some of that tension in her voice still.

“We’re the intelligence branch of the organisation. We specialise in espionage, but we also double up as black ops. Our necessity is to ensure the survivability of Overwatch against all odds.”

A crisp and clear definition, one she would understand, considering her own history in intelligence.

“Only Overwatch?”

Silence. They could all literally see Ana’s facial expression as she judged her. “Yes. Only Overwatch.”

There was some slight fidgeting. “So if I need anything investigated I should come to you?” She sounded skeptical.

“Yes,” Ana said, almost airily.

“What if I don’t feel you would be up to task?”

“Then I suggest you take it up with the United Nations.”

The tension could be cut with the bluntest of butter knives.

“But they will lead me back to you.”

The three of them could literally  _ hear  _ that smile, saccharine, but with an edge sharper than a razor blade. Oh boy. Ana was about to go absolutely in and she was not going to hold back.

“I don’t appreciate subtle threats or invalidation of my job and my organisation,  _ director.”  _ Her voice, though polite was edged with steel. Simard was an extremely opinionated woman according to their research, but they were sure the deep-rooted fear they were feeling was being mirrored in her gut. “I have been in this career path for forty years, twenty of them as a master spy myself. I have done things that would make you puke your guts out, and unlike you I don’t just give orders for other people to take lives. I have taken lives myself, a state sanctioned murderer. I know what I am, and I am not going to hesitate to show you to put you in your place if I have to. Don’t think your bureaucracy can work on me. I was one of the most dangerous snipers alive when your mother was popping you out of her vagina, and I will continue to run Blackwatch they way I always have, in the shadows and not getting involved unless absolutely necessary. I will tell you what you need to know, and you are not,  __ I repeat,  _ you are not  _ at liberty to demand information from me on grounds of “accountability”, because if you read the document I sent you, I’m not accountable to  _ you.  _ I’m accountable to the human race to ensure that Overwatch, though terribly flawed, at least tries in it’s duties to ensure diplomacy and protection of all peoples and their states. I didn’t think as a former high ranking intelligence officer I’d have to explain to you the basic tenets of secrecy in this industry, but I seem to need to be awed every once in a while. Now, if you will excuse me I have work to do. I will send you a general update of everything you need to know concerning Blackwatch by end of work hours this evening. Good day.”

There were quick steps, brisk and hard against tiled floors, and it was then that the three of them knew that meeting was long over, and Ana was on her way back to her office. Without a word all three of them decided to give her some time to cool off before going to see her. This meeting was going to be very interesting.

…

Ana was tired of these shenanigans. She honestly wanted to kick these idiots out of her office and go take a three hour nap, but she couldn’t because not only would her sleep schedule get wrecked, but also her information schedule as well. Said idiots were doing their best to cheer her up, though, and she had to admit that they were doing an excellent job.

“Please tell me her jaw dropped at least once,” Gabriel asked, honestly hopeful and Jack and Reinhardt gasped dramatically. Ana rolled her eyes, not helping a small smile.

“Get out of my office. I need a nap. I’ll call you both tomorrow so that we can discuss you guys going to London.”

You know what, even with this new wench at the helm, not really much would change.

…

Turns out “tomorrow” wasn’t soon enough for when they would meet.

Sombra had gotten in touch with Ana, saying that she had some info on Talon and what they were up to. Ana then told her to pause, as she called Gabriel and Jack to listen to it, and it was then that Sombra also dropped the bombshell that she had some info on Simard.

It had been a while since Ana wanted to finish a mission immediately, right this second.

When they all got back to talking to Sombra, she wasn’t sombre, so at least they knew this was just an update.

“Talon are trembling in their boots. You really got to that Simard bitch, and she immediately went to snitch on you to her bosses, and of course this really isn’t shocking but despite not liking you at all and always being very suspicious of you they have no grounds to come after you, partly due to fear, and partly due to the fact that they would never know where to start. There is absolutely no information on you, no matter how hard they look, and Talon is one of those organisations that thrives on information.”

Well, this was getting a little bit more interesting.

“Okay, so onto the point of this meeting. Talon is running out of funds. After La’Asid was poison and Zheng was blown to the moon the rest of the guys can’t fund Talon alone, so a lot of stuff is being postponed or just straight up being cancelled. Four assassinations have already been carried out so that assets can be grabbed and liquidated, including Petras’. They had a lot of potential in the Democratic Republic of Congo, because the Chinese had made a whole lot of deals with Kinshasa due to the mineral wealth of the country, and Zheng was in charge of that, but now he’s dead, and the Chinese are withdrawing now, reorganising themselves, and then coming back to start from scratch.”

Indeed, Gabriel and Jack were the harbingers of chaos. They knew their actions would cause a bit of a ripple effect, but they honestly never thought it would cause this big of a change.

“If you’re gonna hit them one last time, a big one like all the others, do it now. They are weak and they are divided. They are still obscenely rich by normal standards, but they are not rich enough to sustain their goals. They have corporations and politicians to bribe, and it’s getting increasingly difficult to do that with the surge of violence against them lately, violence that they can’t explain and that they can’t understand. London may be their stronghold, but you’ve got Madeleine. She knows the system because of her parents. She can navigate her way around it.”

“Thank you Sombra. This is going to be a very interesting turn of events. Either way, this mission has been going on for far too long and it’s time we ended it.” She turned to Gabriel and Jack, smiling sweetly. Jack had his face in his hands and he was shaking his head, while Gabriel groaned in annoyance. “Pack up boys, time to go to London.”

When were these espionage exploits going to  _ end?! _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the 3 of you still reading this, there's probably gonna be another couple of chapters. Can't really quantify, but thank you for staying this long nonetheless <3


	18. The end is nigh

How in the fuck was this real life?

They had just touched down, the plane had literally just parked, and they weren’t even allowed to stand up yet. In fact people were just reaching for their phones and putting them on, and it started raining heavily. It was an absolute downpour, and though they didn’t quite have anything to do that day, there was still a certain joint they wanted to visit.

Or as the English called it, a pub.

“I really hate this shitty ass island,” Gabriel grumbled, looking out the window.

“Because of how the weather’s turned to shit?” Jack asked, looking between Gabriel and weather outside and pouting. It really was trash.

Gabriel just eyeballed him. “Actually because of colonialism and imperialism, but mostly because the weather is trash, yes.”

Jack snorted. “Your country has also participated in colonialism and imperialism, you know?”

“There are so many things I can judge you for, Jackie, but you sitting there and thinking I have any sense of love, no matter how abstract for the United States has to be one of the biggest reasons I’m convinced you’re a fucking idiot. Get up and go. The least I could do was eat decent food and sleep after the end of this fucking flight.”

Jack laughed, standing up and collecting his hand luggage. He couldn’t blame Gabriel there. Madeleine could wait until the next day.

…

As usual in London they were booked into a lovely hotel, this time at the Shangri La at the Shard. Ana had also been kind enough to have them share one room (it had a double bed, which, of course, none of the were complaining about in the least), so the first thing they did was have sex on the bed, before falling asleep on each other.

It was beautiful, absolutely fantastic. They both had nothing to do, and they still had a lot of time before dinner and sleep, so they decided might as well spend this time together. It was so slow, so sensual and they honestly could have done it forever. Gabriel was the first one to get into the shower, and Jack, in a show of bravery, joined him.

The shower was great fun, where they spent more time splashing water on each other and giggling after they showered. They were also tracing water on each other’s bodies, and more than twice ahd to hold onto each other to stop from sliding about. The did eventually get out, dry up and run naked right into bed like the juveniles they truly were.

Gabriel had every intention to just cuddle, but Jack had other ideas, which also included cuddling but that was for later. Gabriel was getting comfortable in bed, when he felt a large, warm hand on his cock, stroking gently, in repeated strokes. He was about to open his mouth and ask Jack what exactly the fuck he was thinking, hidden in the covers when he felt him run a finger over a vein and his words died somewhere in his throat. Jack really had a way to control Gabriel’s body with his touch.

Before he could collect his thoughts to try and get Jack to stop it, Jack already had his dick in his mouth, and Gabriel threw his head back, making sure to bite his tongue to stop the shameless moan from coming out. He got the blowjob of his life, somehow managing to push Jack off him just before he came. Jack himself was polite enough to give him the lube, lying flat on his stomach as Gabriel ordered, and soon had buried his fingers in his ass, before fucking him so good by the time he was done Jack stayed still in the bed, cum freely flowing out of his bum before asking if he really,  _ really  _ wanted to go shower.

It’s how they were woken up the next morning by a (relatively rude) phone call from Madeleine, asking to meet them in the lobby of their hotel. She was already there apparently, and she said she would patiently wait for them. She could probably tell from the irritable sleepiness in Gabriel’s voice that she had interrupted their badonkadonk sleep. She honestly didn’t know how to feel about that.

About an hour later found them all in the lobby, overwhelmed by a certain sense of deja vu because this was almost exactly how they first met back in Doha, before their lived got involved in this entire adventure.

“This brings back some very interesting memories, doesn’t it?” She said, looking at them, smirking slightly. Her accent was a tad bit more pronounced than it normally was. They guessed there was some history there, but they weren’t really sure.

She got a variety of hums in response, and she decided it would be best if she actually told them what they needed. There was an international shadowy organisation that was in the midst of collapsing, and they needed to weaken it even more. She however hoped they would sit down sometime and talk about how this entire whirlwind of mission got them together, adn to see if they could perhaps resume this...whatever the hell their relationship was. At least they were friends.

“Alright then, lads. Let’s get to work.” She put on her big ass tablet, opening the links she had of the information that they needed. SHe probably got them from Xin, as they could see the Mandarin notes on the sides.

“First person is this bitch right here.” She brought up a picture of a relatively old lady,  who had so many procedures done on her face they wondered if her muscles were even working. Grey eyes, bloodshot. Her hands and neck very clearly betrayed her age, mid to late sixties going up, despite the smoothness of her face. She looked like she was constantly surprised, probably a side effect of the botox, and she probably had never had any edges in her life.  She had perfectly manicured hands, and one of the rocks on her fingers could probably buy out an entire corporation.

“Theresa Wild. British. English representative on Talon.One of her great grandmothers married nobility and immediately lucked out, getting a whole lot of inheritances when her husband dies a couple of months after the honeymoon. She was very cunning, and though she lived in a society where women didn’t have quarter the rights and authority they do now, she was manipulative enough to use the men around her to do her bidding, as as her coldness and cruelty grew so did her wealth, both of them being directly proportional. She has one daughter who she has groomed to take over from her if something were to go wrong, but recently she has been pulling all her support, material and otherwise out of Talon because she’s scared there won’t be any Talon left soon, and though her resources out of Talon far outnumber those in it, she’s too greedy to let anything go. SHe should be one of the first people you get rid of, since she’s the one that came up with the dystopian future of everybody working as slaves to benefit the few thing. Capitalist down to her bone marrow.”

She swiped the tablet to show them the next person. His age could not be easily distinguished but if any of them could guess it would have to be middle aged, perhaps early to mid forties. His shadow on his chin was greying, with clear green eyes. His lips - or what were supposed to be considered lips, so thin it’s like they weren’t even there - were twisted in a frown. Were all these people just angry in their photos?

“Axel Mendoza. Spanish speaking representative. He’s from Argentina, and he’s the son of a Nazi apologist from Spain. He absolutely hates anybody that’s not male and white, and he too, grew up with the entitlement of generational wealth, because when his great grandfather was running away from neo Nazism he also ran away with about half of Spain’s treasury, ending up in real estate, banking and communications in Argentina, set up under multiple trusts that no one could ever recover. He never married, because he obviously hates women, but he does have a strong of mistresses and he has a son that he’s also grooming to take over from him.”

There seemed to be a recurring theme there, Gabriel pondered as he closed his water bottle. All these people were white, came from predominantly white countries and were heavily aligned to the right wing. They were also all beneficiaries of intergenerational wealth, and as a result had never had to work for anything in their lives, being so used to getting whatever they wanted whenever they wanted it.

No wonder they could barely get along. That clash of ego and wealth was never sustainable in the long run.

There was finally Alsatia Blanc, the French representative (she also had no lips) and Vasily Smirnov, the Russian representative. All white, all rich from old money, all bigoted, all ruthless and all greedy. Despite all their wealth and influence, they still could do nothing to stop the catastrophe that was slowly happening in their organisation. It honestly must have been pretty devastating for them, to see the one thing they had been trained to take over and control  was crumbling before their very eyes.

“So who's the one that hired an investigator to investigate everyone else?” Jack asked, playing a game on his phone.

“Smirnov. He’s the one with the most to lose because he was the one that was stupid enough to invest the most in Talon.” Madeleine closed her tabs, looking at them, quietly enquiring what the next step was gonna be from here.

It was silent for a moment. Gabriel spoke up this time, deciding to first talk to Ana. He had a couple of ideas he thought would work, but he needed some manpower to get them going. Both Jack and Madeleine agreed, and they adjourned their meeting.

This was gonna turn out to be very interesting.

…

Ana, Gabriel and Jack were seated outside some unnecessarily expensive restaurant in some rich and pretentious part of North London, sipping tea and eating carrot cakes.

“For imperial colonialists, I must say they make some pretty decent tea. Carrot cakes are the best I’ve ever tasted in my life too,” Gabriel said, wiping off his fingers. Jack had to force himself to look at the pavement to stop himself from thinking how far up his ass he wanted those fingers.

“How’s Simard?” Jack asked, looking forward to the petty. Both Gabriel and Ana had rubbed off most of their bad habits on him it seemed.

Ana and Gabriel snorted. “Pissed as all hell. She looked like she was about to have a cardiac arrest when I told her I’d be leaving to go in the field, then looked like she was about to have an aneurism immediately after when I told her I wouldn’t tell her for how long, so I should say she’s doing as expected.” She took a sip of her tea.

The plan today was simple. Sombra had managed to get into the system of the investigators that Smirnov had hired, and now she was to relay all that information to them. From then on they would establish who would be the weakest link of the four remaining Talon members, then formulate a method of attack based on the information they had.

Turns out, that he was most suspicious of Mendoza, since he was the only one not from mainland Europe, and a lot of his money had been made from the illicit connections escaped Nazis had come with and were still conducting business with people secretly in Europe. Something about stealing the wealth of Europe and taking it all to South America. It was hilariously ironic, because Smirnov’s family had gotten  _ their  _ wealth from their contribution of the murder and subsequent looting of the Bolsheviks.

No one was really up to anything. In fact it seemed like all of them were equally suspicious of the other. La’Asid and Zheng were the leaders, the two big authorities who would give orders and these orders would be done no questions asked. Now that both leaders had been eliminated within a very short time frame (after La’Asid’s death Zheng had stepped in and he seemed to be stabilising them well enough, before he too was blown to the stratosphere) and the rest of these entitled brats, so used to things being sorted out for them were running around like headless chickens, not knowing what to do, pulling money out of one very doomed investment and pumping it into another one they hoped they would get quick returns, hoping that the money would solve this particular problem as it had always solved the ones in the past.

Most of their financial operations constitute them removing most of their money and taking them to their home countries, which contributed to the destabilisation of Talon. There was also, the very interesting issue that since Talon was fast running out of money, since the owners of the money were hoarding it out, there was the small issue of payments (mostly bribes and coercion money) that were supposed to be made, not being made. Bank heads, powerful heads of state and heads of government, influential members and/or heads of large corporations and institution, the United Nations and its affiliations, and other illegal entities. Most of these people got into their positions of power and influence because of Talon, since they were put there by an organisation powerful enough to coerce entire governments, but since this organisation had suddenly disappeared, these guys were starting to fear for everything.

Interesting.

“What do you wanna do now?” Sombra asked, unwrapping a lollipop.

Ana was silent for a moment. “Let’s go bold, but petty. Wire some cash out of their accounts, slowly, over the course of a couple of months. Look for accounts that are relatively dormant, but have a substantial amount of money. Let’s work with that for now and see what they do in response.” 

She turned to Jack and Gabriel. “There are some bank heads I’d like you guys to look at, and the Governor of the Bank of England. All of them are Talon, and the deputy minister of the exchequer. Talk to them, I’ll make that bitch organise a meeting. We’ll be on the downlow for about a month, then from there we will see what happens and work accordingly.”

This mission was ending soon, and it was gonna be with a bang. About goddamn time too.

...

Simard hadn’t even been in a month and Gabriel and Jack could already feel her frustration. It was the eve of their meeting with Thomas Pendant, the Permanent Secretary to the Exchequer, one of the most powerful Talon members in the UK. It was after meeting with him that they would meet with the heads of the four main banks that were also involved in Talon: HSBC, Bank Of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group and Barclays Banking Group.

Ana was giggling diabolically the whole time. Both of them had a feeling Simard wasn’t going to be Director at Overwatch very long.

“SHe honestly looked like she wanted to self combust when I gave her the template to sign. She had the nerve to demand who the agents were assigned to this mission and I told her I’d find her signature and forge it if she wouldn’t sign it. She honestly has no idea what is going on and she’s terrified of that prospect.”

Yep. Definitely wouldn’t last long.

“Anyway, we got you an appointment. Tomorrow at eleven at his office. You’re probably gonna see the heads of the banks the day after, see how fast they are trembling in their boots.”

Talon was most likely crumbling. It will take time, but they were glad that they played a very significant place in it.


	19. Tables are turning

The man sweating lead and shitting bricks. He had good instincts, because he honestly looked like he was about to bolt the fuck out of there. Unfortunately, he was stuck in there with them until the end of this meeting. There were a lot of discrepancies in the budgetary allocation of the United Kingdom to the EU and the UN, and Gabriel and Jack were here, on behalf of the United Nations to politely enquire why.

“Well, you know we’ve had to divert some of these funds to domestic purposes, and surely The United Nations and the European Union has other member states contributing to their causes. We have consistently been donating for the past half decade. I do wonder if we can be excused this year,” the Minister said, crossing his hands in front of him on his desk, leaning forward to look at them, not even keeping eye contact for more than thirty seconds at a time.

Sir Pendant really did not want to be there at any point in time. Being a Talon big man he was used to impunity and not being held accountable, and now that he was here, being asked to do exactly that, his powerful protectors literally disappeared from the face of the earth, he was in a bit of a pickle, as the English themselves said.

Gabriel in particular and Jack were  _ relishing  _ in it.

“I’m afraid not, Sir Chancellor,” Gabriel purred. “You signed contracts. You have legal obligations to to keep, since you are a part of these organisations, and you do use quite a number of resources from them. It’s not very fair for you to give the least and use the most. I’m very sure you can agree to that. You as your government’s finance head should have predicted that you would have had financial issues and as a result you should not have signed those agreements. Claiming you are having financial difficulties in the middle of them really goes to show how irresponsible your government is in the region, and considering the...diplomatic struggles you have been having in the recent past, I highly doubt that is the picture you’d like to to pain of your state in the international community.”

He literally had nothing to say to that.

“I’m going to have to discuss this with the Prime Minister,” he mumbled, reaching for his glass of water and gulping it all down, before refilling it.

Jack nodded once. “Of course, Sir Chancellor. Take your time. We will be back in a couple of days, to discuss the state of your major banks. They too have been having some issues with their fiscal policies. We can discuss that in our next meeting, no?”

The man looked like he was ascending into the blackest void of the shadow realm. This was gonna go great.

…

Gabriel could feel his soul regenerating. Jack wasn’t even pretending to be subtle. They were absolutely enjoying this circus that Ana had created. Sombra had asked them more than once why they loved doing this so much, if they were entirely sane.

“Good afternoon, gentlemen,” Jack begun, giving them all the documents he had carried with him, feeling vindictive pettiness flow through him as he watched them turn paler than paper, as he fixed his laptop, ready to give the presentation he and Gabriel had prepared the previous day. “As you can see we have quite a bit to discuss regarding your duties and obligation towards the UN, and to some extent the EU.”

The tension could be cut with a  butter knife.

These gentlemen seemed to be getting paler and paler as Gabriel and Jack produced more statistics. There seemed to be a lot of money disappearing into assets abroad, expensive assets that were not being taxed. There was even liquidated money that was being wired out to offshore accounts, disappearing for a couple of years and later materialising back in trusts, mere months before the trust was to be dissolved. All these particular investments seemed to be getting the highest levels of clearance sometimes not even directos of of local branches not knowing what was going on, making those particular transactions not appearing on the books. There seemed to be an entire black market of illicit transfers of large amounts of money around continents, circulating and getting into what seemed like dormant bank accounts, but they were in actuality dummy accounts, locked up from the institutions by day but used by night. Rogue employees, most of them relations of these powerful heads of financial institutions were the ones that ensured this illicit transactions happened, controlling them according to the timezones. All this, of course, meant figures in the books were seriously being cooked, because if not then auditors would have field day uncovering discrepancy after discrepancy, and crumbling Talon, already an absolute mess, couldn’t have any more problems piled on their plate.

“May we know exactly what is happening here and why international and local banking regulators did nothing?” Gabriel asked politely, internally smirking at the materialised disheartened looks on their faces. 

Of course, Gabriel and Jack knew exactly what was going on.

LLoyd Banking Group and HSB Corporation were in a fight.Both of them had been strong supporters of Talon, allowing the members to open accounts with them and make large transactions, particularly in Europe, North America and the developed East. The organisation was now crumbling, and upper management and the board were scrambling to take what was left of the assets, assets which they were not sure they could afford, and which they could not demand from members, as only the members at the top knew just how deep into doom the organisation was.

These board members did not even know that two of the most powerful Talon members were dead, but they  _ did  _ notice that funds were dwindling, and since they had been investing a little bit more recklessly, they were losing liquidated cash real quick. Lloyds already had almost experienced a bank run, and they desperately needed assets to sell to inject some cash into their operations, but HSBC was not going to make it easy for them,  and vice versa.

Barclays PLC and Standard Chartered PLC were an entirely different mess altogether. Talon, knowing the board was a little more difficult to get to decided to put their people in very strategic positions, to be able to help run their operations for them. Of course since there were no Talon sympathisers at the top they were much more heavily regulated and really weren’t involved in too much black market shenanigans, but it was enough to get them in trouble financially, and some of their assets had already been taken by Talon debtors, which included HSBC and Lloyd. It was only about time (and by only about time they meant after this meeting) that the board would know exactly what was going on, and then there was going to be a a real fiasco. Gabriel and Jack couldn’t wait.

What about Bank of Scotland, one would ask. How were they roped into this whole mess?

They had no idea, absolutely no idea of this whole mess with Talon, money and internal wrangles. All they were trying to do was help - ironic, a major Scottish Bank helping English banks, considering the history between Scotland and England - and, of course, there were financial ramifications for Scotland as a whole if English banks collapsed, or in this case, were at risk of collapsing. They had quite a number of customers in England, and also quite a number of joint business transactions there, and their interests would obviously be harmed if something happened to these English banks.

Which, of course, was the reason they decided they would talk to them later. Now, they wanted to see how far into the earth these particular clowns could dig themselves into.

The answer was very, very far. It took all of Jack’s control and a couple of sweet smiles from Gabriel to stop himself from laughing and just laying all the receipts they had.

“I...well, I can only speak for my organisation, so I suppose I can answer most of your questions.” The head of Barclays was going to be the first one to roast themselves. This was going to be an absolute delight.

…

Ana could only be reduced to incredulous staring, her mouth slightly agape. It was about two months after the boys had held the meetings with the bank heads, and the last time European Financial Markets were this tits up in all forms of drama and scandal was during the Global Financial Crisis. She was honestly awed at the anarchy her agents could create if they decided on it.

“You have, in about an hour, thrown the  _ entire European Financial World  _ into disarray. Do you understand how  _ dangerous  _ that is?!”

Jacked sipped his herbal tea, smirking and making Gabriel shift in his chair. There was just something so seductive about Jack just going into full petty mode. He really needed to get his hormones in order because he had to pay attention here instead of thinking about how good his name would sound from Jack’s lips when he took his entire dick in his mouth.

“That was the entire point, wasn’t it?” Jack asked smoothly.

According to Ana, everything had gone to shit. Because a lot of the bigger banks had been...exposed so to speak of their more than questionable antics. Barclays and Standard Chartered had literally gone on an employee purge, systematically going through their entire payroll in their headquarters in London, investigating them for any Talon allegiances and purging them.

What made it even worse was that these employees never knew, because it was not a systematic purge, so as much as they felt sorry for the regular people that were not involved, as they were terrified that they may have done something wrong and may be next on the chopping block, for the most part they were perfectly fine.

Bank of Scotland though? They had decided to completely pull out. They announced, publicly, that they had stopped helping fund these major banks due to “major differences in business practices”, and the business world as a result was going insane. Companies as a whole had been making speculations about what was generally happening in the industry, but since everyone was remaining tight lipped, nobody really knew what was happening.

Except, of course, Blackwatch.

“Well, that would explain Simard. She has been getting progressively worse.”

Being nosy, Gabriel and Jack could not stop incessantly pestering her about what “progressively worse” meant in that context, so she released them and told them to go see for herself. As they suspected, that term was just about the biggest understatement of the century.

It had been just over three months and she looked like she had aged two decades. Her eyes had gotten noticeably greyer, and her bags under her eyes bigger. She looked visibly more tired and rumour had it that she wasn’t as shapr tongued and as short with people as when she came, unless a journalist tested her. She was the first in the office and the last out, and though her performance had been impeccable, Ana’s difficulty combined with Talon crumbling before her very eyes had taken a massive toll on her and her health. She was very lucky her job provided her with health insurance. She was an absolute mess.

She more than deserved it.

In her frustration in not knowing who any Blackwatch agents were, she had been going round harassing Overwatch employees, demanding they tell her where the agents’ profiles were and how she can get a hold of them. SHe also did not believe them when they said that they did not know anything about Blackwatch because there was simply nothing about them in the system, and after haggling and harassing the IT department, they sent her to Ana, whom she was terrified to go to because she knew it was none of her business.

In truth she was paranoid, very much so. She had worked in intelligence before, so she  _ knew.  _ Somewhere deep down she knew Talon was crumbling. She knew her role in it, and she knew they were the ones that were the reason she was in that position in the first place. She knew that if they go down, she would definitely go down with them, and that would mean all her crimes as the head of Canadian intelligence would be exposed, and she really couldn’t have that.

Which would explain the bewildered look on Sombra’s face when she got in touch with them on a certain evening in Ana’s office. She had contacted them separately, telling them she had news for them.

“Should I just tell it to you outright or do you want context?” she asked, looking between them and he own screen, lollipop going from one corner of her mouth to the other as she typed furiously on her keyboard, he nails clicking on the keys with the occasional pause.

Ana, Jack and Gabriel all exchanged a look. “Just tell us what you’re telling us.”

Sombra looked at them for a second. “Smirnov and Wild are dead. Both suicides.” She said, matter of fact. She risked a glance at all three of them and they looked relatively unmoved, though she could see slight signs of shock. “They were said to have foam out of their mouths when their bodies were found, so I suspect a really toxic poison. Trademark of a certain group of bigots we all know that have been hated throughout history, but I’ll have to wait for the doctors to finish their tests before I can hack their systems.”

There was a long contemplative pause, and Ana, Gabriel and Jack’s minds were working at a million miles a second.

“How old is this news?” Ana asked, calm, deceptively so.

Sombra paused for a moment, squinting at her screen. “Can’t be more than half an hour old. They are trying to get in touch with anyone that might know the motivations of them deciding to do this, but I strongly suspect it’s because they realised there was money getting out of their accounts without their permission but they could not trace it.”

Oh so they were  _ that  _ badly off?

“The banks obviously had no authorisation to do it, and as a result it was really difficult for them to trace it. These banks also realised that Talon really isn’t as powerful as they once were, that they were crumbling and that they could now afford to tell them no without too much consequence, so when they insisted that they were completely unable to trace the money these guys went into full panic mode. Considering their entire self worth and existences are based on how much they have at any given time, it was too much of a burden for them to handle. Their names and reputations would be dragged through the mud and they honestly could not have that, falling from grace that hard, so they decided suicide is the best route. Pretty selfish honestly, but my opinion is irrelevant here. I’ll get back to you guys later with the exact cause of suicide, but considering how far their guys are going to hide their deaths - even the banks don’t know, so they are still managing their accounts going by second hand instructions - it’s gonna be a while before this news gets out.”

How the tables had turned.


	20. Finally the mighty have fallen.

This, truly, was one of the most batshit insane idea Gabriel and Jack   had ever had pitched to her, but it was also one that was just insane enough to work.

To think that Jack is the one that suggested it too.

She turned to look back at Sombra, Gabriel and Jack. “That is a very...out there suggestion. Let me sleep on it, then I’ll get back to you all tomorrow.”

They all agreed, giving her a variety of affirmations before leaving her office, or disconnecting her video call in Sombra’s case. Once she was alone, she sat in her chair, more than a little dazed, thinking about how far they had come, the risks they had took, how her two best agents and closest friends nearly dies in all different ways, how much they were risking for this damned organisation and the world, and honestly speaking, she would do it all over again. She knew putting Gabriel and Jack together would cause all manner of chaos, but this, this was something for the history books.

A lot had happened the past twenty four hours. Far too much, more than should be allowed to happen.

It was true that Smirnov and Wild had commited suicide, and it was true that they had done it because money was leaving and they could not trace it. The new details that had emerged was that they were the first ones to do it because relative to the other members of Talon elite they were the ones with the least net worth. They knew with the disappearance of their wealth their respect would also disappear, so they decided life truly wasn’t worth living if you weren’t respected.

Of course they were right, but those were philosophies for another time.

Cause of death? Cyanide poisoning. It was installed in their mouth, bottom right corner of their molar. If they bit hard enough they would pop the capsule and would die a relatively quick, but also quite painful death. If they did not have any heirs then the other members of Talon (or really, what was left of it) would absorb their wealth. It turned out the other members of Talon weren’t interested in failing capitalists, since they were trying to prevent meeting the same fate themselves, so they just decided to nope the fuck out of that hot mess and deal with their own shit. Not very easy trying to revive and horribly failing...whatever the hell Talon was. Organisation? Empire? Who knew? Blackwatch certainly didn’t.

It turned out that they did have heirs who were supposed to take over from their mess, all of them very knowledgeable and quite experienced in the world of commerce and how the international financial systems worked, but as they all knew, Talon was an entirely different animal altogether. They were taking over a crumbling organisation, were rapidly losing money and were supposed to be working with people that, as best, did not trust them at all.

Sombra sent them all detailed information sheets of what she knew was going on at the time. Apparently the banks still had no idea that these people were dead, and it was instead now the heirs that were giving these instructions. They were trying very hard to have people not know what was going on - even Simard had no idea that she was only left with two bosses now -  and that they were still trying to do some damage control and trying to figure out how they would break out this news to the public. Entire companies would collapse and international markets would be horribly crippled, but it was also only a matter of time before someone leaked this word out somehow.

Which is how Jack managed to come up with his brilliant idea. He suggested calling the remaining members of Talon - especially the older ones, the two who were of the original six that are the only ones currently alive - and have a meeting with them, to see how Talon can be dissolved without too much drama. At first it seemed like the most absurd thing that could ever happen, but with some thought, it would actually make sense in the long run.

It had always been clear that the only thing(s) these people feared were loss of money and loss of reputation, so silly little things like “laws” and “governments” and “jails” honestly meant so little to them, because then their companies would still be making massive profits. So, naturally, giving them to their respective governments to take through the respective judicial channels - and not to mention there was a risk that they had bought off the politicians, judges and lawyers that would be in the system - really wasn’t going to help anyone in the long run, least of all weaken Talon more than it already was.

So this meeting would be summoned to tell them the only thing that would terrify them: that if they would not go along with their terms and conditions, information about them would slowly be leaked. Not through mass media, but mostly through the internet. Slowly, bit by bit, and people would understand what was going on. Slowly over time they would be despised, and people would call for their blood.  People would stop associating with their business, or at least it would reduce substantially, and they would lose a whole lot of money.

It was brilliant in its simplicity, but there were other factors involved as well. For instance, how they would tell Simard without her resorting to killing herself, and there was also the issue of convincing these Talon folks that they wouldn’t die after this meeting.

Perhaps, depending on what they agreed on. 

That, however was the bridge that would be crossed when they got to it. For now, they just had to plan how to execute all of this.

…

“I honestly cannot believe you insane idiots are making me do this,” Ana grumbled, looking between Gabriel, Jack and Sombra.

“The fact that you believe anyone can make you do anything makes me question your intelligence,” Gabriel responded, deadpan. Ana immediately turned to him, offended because he was right. Sombra then interrupted them, asking if what she had sent them was the plan in motion, and telling them that she was going to start sending out the notifications within the next six hours. Ana nodded, agreeing with everything after she read it, and Sombra excused herself.

“Now, we wait,” Gabriel said, leaning back in his chair.

How exactly had they decided to do this, one would ponder? Well, first of all SOmbra would send the respective parties correspondence. Nothing too complex, just asking them to come to Blackwatch headquarters and negotiate their survival. If they would not respond within twenty four hours then Blackwatch would assume that they were not interested, and they would hunt them down, asking them to explain Talon in its entirety and what they intended to do in the future. The implicit threat that they would be eliminated if Blackwatch felt they were a threat was obviously there. Ana was confident that this lot was smart enough to get it.

After the responses they would get, whatever they were, they would inform Simard. Not ask, inform her. As in they would tell her because this was a decision that they had already made, and her objections really would be relevant.

If she even had the strength to make any objections.

From there, they would proceed, depending on whether or not they would agree on talking or not.

…

It honestly never took long for the responses to come in.

Mendoza and Blanc, the last remaining members of Talon were quick to respond. The hesitation to come was clearly there, because they were not exactly sure what they would find, but they were also smart enough to know better. They also said that the new representatives would not be coming. It would just be the two of them representing the organisation.

Or more specifically, what was left of the organisation.

That, of course, raised everyone’s hackles. Why were the new representatives not coming? It’s not like they weren’t aware of the state of affairs of everything. Weren’t they supposed to have been trained for this kind of thing all their loves? There were a lot of questions there that needed answers, but that was for another time. Either way, Sombra would be keeping an eye out on these new representatives as the older ones had their meeting.

Next stop was talking to Simard. Ana thought this would be the best time to introduce Gabriel and Jack to her, just to see how far into the shadow realm she could tumble. Then when introductions were done they would inform her of what they had planned, and tell her to approve of arrangements for having people who were literally going to enslave the human race there.

The secretary this time looked like she had been dragged from the underworld. “Ms. Simard will see you now.” Even her voice was croaky, like she was beyond exhausted.

They walked into the office, an office they had been in multiple times. It wasn’t that different from when the former director Petras was there, except maybe some more paintings on the wall. Simard, bags under her eyes probably about 5 pounds by now, looked up at the three of them, the panic quite obvious in her eyes.

“What do you want?” She asked Ana quickly, accent noticeably thicker and voice slightly higher. “Who are these men?”

Ana wanted very much to roll her eyes, but she refrained herself. “Hello Simard. These are Gabriel Reyes and Jack  Morrison, two of my best agents. We’re here today to inform you of a meeting that will be happening, that you will be attending, and we don’t want you to panic when Gabriel and Jack are there.”

She blinked blankly at them.

“Now that that’s out of the way, we should tell you about this meeting. We will be meeting with Axel Mendoza and Alsatia Blanc. I’m sure you are at least aware of who they are. Gabriel and Jack have been investigating them for a while, as they have been involved in some very questionable activities. We need them to come here to answer to some questions, and as director of Overwatch, you must be there.”

SHe honestly looked like she was going to collapse.

“We will inform you when they get here. Please make sure you have a flexible programme for the next few days. We hope to finish this meeting in at least two days, as we all have work to do, so we would really appreciate your cooperation on this.” They walked out before she had a chance to respond.

This was going to be interesting.

…

“Please do not indict us. Please. We will do anything as long as nobody knows what we have done.”

Well, absolutely none of them were expecting this.

Mendoza and Blanc had finally arrived. To say there were intimidated would be an understatement, since they had shown to be very unsettled when they arrived. Ana, Gabriel and Jack weren’t even the ones that received them (It was Simard) and no matter how hard she tried to reassure them that everything was going to be fine, they still felt very out of their element. 

Mendoza was the one that pleaded for mercy, not wanting to be prosecuted. Ironic seeing as when he was busy assassinating his rivals and making other people suffer for his own benefit, monetary or otherwise he seemed to have absolutely no mercy at all. Life truly comes at you fast.

Blanc was silent, her non existent lips constantly pursed. It was pretty obvious that she was nervous. It was all over her body language, and she also only seemed to answer questions in monosyllables. It was pretty clear that she too was scared of what her fate would be, but she decided, as a method of self preservation - quite wise, Ana thought - that it would be best if she would say as little as possible, only what was necessary and keep her cards close to her chest because she wasn’t quite sure if something she’d say would get her in even more shit than she already was.

Despite that, the meeting went ahead. Ana, Gabriel and Jack were being petty on purpose, just to see these guys squirm, see how they felt being on the other side. They thought they had really seen it all in terms of them being uncomfortable, until they mentioned their terms.

“You have all caused a great deal of pain and suffering to very many people in your quest for greed. Therefore, in order to substantially reduce the amount of shit you’ll be in, it would be very wise if you used your profits - all the profits you’ve made over time - to rectify the damage you’ve done. Of course you can’t fix all of it, but you can improve the quality of life you went out of your way to destroy because for some reason you still needed more money that you could ever spend.”

The sudden change in the atmosphere was almost instantaneous, going from tense to straight up terrified. Mendoza and Blanc could only stare wide eyes, mouths agape, the fear and helplessness written very clearly in their gazes. Their worst nightmare was beginning to happen, and for the first time in their lives, they could do nothing to stop it.

And they had no choice but to accept it. It looked like finally,  _ finally  _ Talon had fallen.

…

Gabriel and Jack were outside the Overwatch base, drinking tea and eating all manner of pastries, enjoying the view of the mountains in the background outside the cafe they were at.

Jack glanced over at Gabriel, who was eyeing his croissant with a scrutiny that should be reserved for reports. It’s like he was analysing it, and Jack actually giggled quietly when he tried to take it apart, then paused for a moment and tried to put it back together again when he realised how soft the inside was because it was warm and he wanted it to stay that way. He was so cute when he was doing dumb shit.

“You can just bite into it, you know,” Jack said, buttering his own croissant. “It’s supposed to be eaten when it’s warm coz it’s nice and soft inside.”

Gabriel eyed him for a moment, before he went back to scrutinising his pastry. “Hmm. Like your ass, huh?” He said casually.

Jack, absolutely not expecting that, spurted out his coffee, some of it over the table, but he managed to push himself from it and spurt the rest of it on the ground in front of him, nearly choking on his croissant, face redder than a ketchup bottle from mortification. Surrounding tables looked at them and the waitress that served them was hesitant to come and ask if there was a problem, because Gabriel, smirking, finally took a bite of his croissant.

“I hate you so fucking much,” Jack murmured, face still red and trying to wipe his mess from the table.

“That’s not what you said when my tongue was - “

“Excuse me,” Jack interrupted swiftly in flawless French, calling for the waitress. Gabriel chuckled. “Can I please have some more serviettes?”

This was the man he was going to grow old with, and he honestly couldn’t have been happier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright folks. This is it. The end.
> 
> Thank you so much for sticking through, especially the six of you that have always been reading. I truly appreciate the support, and I hope you continue staying with me as I regurgitate the contents of my last 5 brain cells.
> 
> Peace and see you on the next episode of Nat writes Gabe and everyone else!!


End file.
